Crazy Heart
Composite Score: 83.37
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Colin Farrell, Paul Herman, Jack Nation, and Robert Duvall
Director: Scott Cooper
Writer: Scott Cooper
Genres: Drama, Music, Romance
MPAA Rating: R for language and brief sexuality
Box Office: $47.41 million worldwide
Why should you Watch This Film?
Crazy Heart is Scott Cooper’s film adaptation of the novel of the same name by Thomas Cobb, following the fictional country singer Bad Blake through the later stages of his music career. The film stars Jeff Bridges in the role of Bad Blake for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, supported by Maggie Gyllenhaal, Colin Farrell, Robert Duvall, and the child actor Jack Nation. The film tells a story of love, recovery, and the unstoppable flow of time set against the backdrop of country music – reminiscent at varying times of Tender Mercies and A Star Is Born. Thanks to Bridges’s performance and the phenomenal soundtrack this film has found its way onto the list.
Why shouldn’t you Watch This Film?
Outside of the acting and music, Crazy Heart falls a little flat. It hits the right emotional notes; it just doesn’t hit them very hard. It’s got the right story beats, but the story just feels a little bit underwhelming. (This might also be coming from the fact that this was the fourth film I watched over the weekend after The Grand Budapest Hotel, Once Upon a Time in America, and Short Cuts, all of which have much more complex and sweeping stories.) For me, though, Crazy Heart is one of those films that was made to get a strong performance from its lead and support it with a little bit of acting and technique – in this case music – on the side. It’s definitely not perfect, but I don’t know that it has to be simply because of how good the music and acting are.
So wait, why should you Watch This Film?
Jeff Bridges absolutely earns his Oscar in this film – playing a washed-up former country music star, complete with the alcoholism and decent singing voice, to perfection. From the first scene where he walks up to the bar in the bowling alley where he’s been booked, it’s clear that Bridges is the focus of the film, and he bears that burden well. Even in the moments where the story lags a bit, Bridges manages to keep things moving forward and keep the audience focused on him. As ugly and grumpy as he unquestionably is as Bad Blake, he manages to use some secret charisma to get the audience on his side, rooting for a comeback and for him to get healthy. Even his romance with Maggie Gyllenhaal’s Jean Craddock doesn’t feel out of place thanks to ability to communicate a genuine love in his performance for the character and her son.
Supplementing the performance that Bridges gives is the music of the film, written by Stephen Bruton and T Bone Burnett, that plays across the story. Every song feels like an actual country song that wasn’t just written for a film but that might be heard on the radio, and the film’s last song, “The Weary Kind,” which won Best Original Song at the Oscars brings it all together. The film’s music doesn’t just sit as a backdrop against which the film plays; it communicates who the characters are and how their desires are expressed. The music captures the spirit of Bad Blake and his protégé Tommy Sweet (Farrell), and with the actors actually performing the music, it sticks with you as something you might want to hear again.
An excellent original country music soundtrack interplaying with an all-time great performance from Jeff Bridges turns Crazy Heart from a run-of-the-mill music fictional biography into one of the Greatest Films of All Time. Its simple story would be lost to time without those two things, but on the whole, the film comes out as a solid piece of filmmaking. This film is currently available to rent on most streaming services if you’re looking for where to watch it.
