Crazy Heart (2010)

…Okay, country music fans: here is the film that you haven’t heard about and the film that you hadn’t been dying for, but is certainly worth your nine bucks...but now you know that because you probably watched the Academy Awards.

…One issue that deserves attention is the “the happy ending.”

What qualifies this ending as “happy?” For one, sixteen months after declaring himself sober, Bad Blake, is still sober. What would disqualify this ending from being “happy?” From Bad’s point of view, “his girl” (meaning ex-girlfriend whom he still loves) wears an engagement ring that Bad didn’t give her. Additionally, for the second time in his life, he has lost a son—his exgirlfriend’s four year old son, Buddy. (This is a nice touch, pointed out to me by JMill, as the last time Bad saw his own son, he was also four. And, JMill continues, the movie doesn’t beat us over the head with this subtle bit of fictional “magic”; rather, we’re informed at one time the age of his girl’s son and at another that Bad hasn’t seen his own son in twenty-four years and at another that his son is now twenty-eight.) Back to the happy side, his relationship with Tony Sweet, Bad’s former protégé who “sold out,” seems repaired; and, his agent, who hassles Bad all movie long, is now satisfied as Bad agrees to open for Sweet (The bad / sweet opposition seems too strong, now that I think about it). But then again, his girl who is not his girl is happy with him, and he seems, however perfunctorily, happy for her (to me, this is the heart of the movie, as Blake is a performer and entertainer and in the final scene he has to give a performance, of sorts). The end then introduces a brief encore of pleasantly predictable conflict as his ex invites Bad to talk with her son, Buddy. He politely declines. The camera swiftly zooms out and the remaining figures shrink in the Arizona landscape. Somehow, “it feels all good.” But when I think of Bad’s perspective, it seems things aren’t all good. The resonating effect, then, is one where he makes decisions to make others happy, as I imagine is the essence of the life of a performing artist. Bad’s own desires shrink in the background.

...another something to think about, a pattern I notice in my tastes for stories, is that stories are often a process of creation.

Here, I'm not talking about the process of an artist creating the story. I'm talking about a story which is an adventure into creation. Perhaps you've read The Known World by Edward P. Jones. The novel is coyly presented as a mural--a collection of stories and illustrations that are not in chronological order. The novel ends with the image of a mural depicting all of the stories and illustrations we've read. I also read recently an experimental novel by Raymond Federman, Double or Nothing , which uses the writing of a book as its principle conceit (though I discourage this, as it's a tired conceit in 2010). In Crazy Heart, Bad struggles to write new songs and much of the film focuses on his process of songwriting. The value of writing a fiction that is an "adventure into creation" is twofold. For one, it's the story's propeller, which often comes in the form of a protagonist's desires. Secondly, a character with a creative process is expected to be quirky, irrational, and/or passionate--the characteristics that lead to unique and memorable characters.