orangerful | Walk the Line (Reply)

so I watched 'Walk the Line' over the weekend. It was alright. Definately nowhere near as moving or interesting as Ray...which is ironic because it had a lot of parallels. In the same way that every episode of 'behind the music' has a lot of parallels - married young, had babies, got famous, wants other woman, gets denied, takes drugs/drinks, destroys marriage, somehow gets other woman to like him, the end.

But I think I figured out the root of the problem for this film - it's based on Cash's autobiography. I think that's a mistake. When you're writing a bio-pic you should really go for a third person biography so you can get some outside perspective. I was talking to a co-worker and she said she felt that Reese's part was very flat. And I know why - June Carter, at least for the first chunk of their relationship it seems, was merely a goal for Johnny. Something to work towards having. She's the nicest person in his world, so she's pretty much perfect. Perfect = BORING. The relationship really needed to be explored further.

I was really confused about their age difference too. Johnny has a magazine with June on the cover while he's in the army. Now, I know girls got married and had kids very young back in the day, but still, you'd think they would have brought that up. It seemed like June was much older.

I also felt like I was supposed to FEEL something during the big Folsom Prison show. Like that was a big step for Cash, to play there. But it didn't feel like a full circle. It didn't feel like an amazing thing. It didn't feel like he was sticking it to the man, because never before had he wished to stick it to the man.

I know lives don't have themes. But movies need a connecting theme to make them work. Ray Charles has this whole cycle that returns him in the end to his family and he starts acting like a father and a husband yadda yadda. They sort of hint at that at the very very end of 'walk the line', along with hinting that maybe his dad doesn't hate him anymore, but they didn't convince me.

And I'm sure how he proposed to June is true and factual, but I didn't like it. You do not put a woman under that kind of pressure when it comes to making a big life decision. I mean, he pretty much had a little hissy fit, and then stared her down. Hmmmmm.

There was one scene that was missing - one scene that I think would have made the movie stronger on several levels. We see June home along composing 'Ring of Fire'. Later we see them both on tour singing 'ring of fire' after it has obviously already become a hit. WHERE IS THE SCENE IN BETWEEN! The scene where she shares this song with Cash. Where she gives it to him. Where they work together to create the classic! It would have showed us his musical journey, along with his emotional journey of finding a soulmate in June.

Joaquin Phoenix was good. His Cash impersonation was well done. For some reason I forgot that Cash would have been around the same time as the Elvis. Country music is on a whole different radar to me. Same label too. It's before the big Rock - Country split, which I think happens when the Fab Four show up and Pop/Rock takes on elements of R&B a little more.

It's worth a rental. I just think it felt very unfocused. Ther writer obviously wanted to cover as much of Cash's life as he could, but in doing so we ended up more with a live action version of 'Behind the Music' instead of a movie telling us a story.