crazy heart

i recently saw crazy heart at the local theater.

i like those sad cowboy kind of stories. i like desolation, mistakes, and shots at redemption.

i read a lot about crazy heart. i read about how it wouldn't have worked without t bone burnett. the man is a freaky genius.

it wouldn't have worked without jeff bridges, either.

by the way... his website is so fun. lots of little cool things to unearth over there. and he has a decent photography habit, too.

but all of the reading, and anything i was expecting to think about during the film? by the time bad blake stumbled out of his chevy suburban in front of the spare room bowling alley, it was gone. my usual super-annoying meta-awareness was taking a nap in the back room while i threw myself wholeheartedly into the small slice i was getting to see of bad blake and his hassles and his heart.

i absolutely loved maggie gyllenhaal. i've never seen a movie where she had such a large role, and she was magical. i believed her for each and every second. that's rare for me, to find that kind of trust with a female actor. and robert duvall? and colin farrell? i want to call them the icing on the cake, but they were more substantial than that. it was like cutting a perfect slice of beautifully iced cake, only to discover that it's filled with sliced fresh strawberries.

and one of the biggest treats in the whole thing? this song. it's called, "the weary kind" that was co-written by t bone burnett and ryan bingham.

i love the song. i love the voice. i loved the whole movie, and i really recommend it.