Crazy Heart
Crazy Heart features Jeff Bridges and Maggie Gyllenhaal doing some of their finest work which is saying something as their work is usually exemplary especially Bridges. Think Jennings-Kristopherson-Haggard and you’ve got Bad Blake (Bridges), a has-been country music legend who long ago succumbed to a hedonistic lifestyle of alcohol and loose women so that at 57 he’s broke and playing every dive between Houston and El Paso that will let him rest on his laurels for a few bucks. He holds in contempt the people who have faith in him the most namely his agent Jack Greene (Paul Herman) and his ex-protégé Tommy Sweet (Colin Farrell). Not surprisingly about the only one he has a good word for is his favourites bartender Wayne (Robert Duvall), that is until he meets a smitten journalist named Jean Craddock (Gyllenhaal). He gives her the scoop and she dishes out the sugar and Bad starts to have feelings that he could only write about before. Is it enough though to get the train wreck he calls a life back on track? The story doesn’t contain a lot of drama but what’s there is subtle and not predictable. T-Bone Burnett, who penned the award winning music for O Brother, Where Art Thou? composed the films original rootsy music which provides one of the few negatives. They keep fading it down to get back to the story and the music is a delight for traditional country fans.