Joaquin Phoenix, Reese Witherspoon and Ginnifer Goodwin in the James Mangold movie ‘Walk the Line’

Biopic movies have had a place in cinema since I began taking movies serious enough to rank movies. Country musician Johnny Cash received such treatment based in part on his autobiographies Man in Black: His Own Story in His Own Words of 1975 and Cash: The Autobiography, with Patrick Carr, of 1997 plus. Walk the Line (2005) received that plus deeper treatment with additional screenwriting from Gill Dennis and director James Mangold. Friend of the Matt Lynn Digital blog Cobra listed Walk the Line at #16 on his listing of top 20 movies as recently as 2018.

(From left, Reese Witherspoon as June Carter and Joaquin Phoenix as Johnny Cash in the James Mangold movie Walk the Line).

The movie itself begins with scenes of family life for the Johnny Cash from 1944 in Dyess, Arkansas. We meet Johnny Cash‘s mother Carrie, his abusive father Ray, and his brother Jack. Robert Patrick, Shelby Lynne, Lucas Till and Ridge Canipe portrayed Ray, Carrie, Jack and Johnny at this point of the movie, with tragedy befalling Jack and Ray severely resenting Johnny for it. Joaquin Phoenix would go on to portray Johnny Cash as an adult.

(Ginnifer Goodwin as Vivian Cash in the James Mangold movie Walk the Line).

It’s 1950 when Johnny Cash joins the U.S. Air Force. Cash takes a liking to writing songs while stationed in West Germany, developing Folsom Prison Blues before returning to the United States when discharged in 1954. Cash would marry his first wife, Vivian Cash as portrayed by Ginnifer Goodwin, before the couple moved to Memphis, Tennessee. Vivian inspired Cash‘s first hit song I Walk the Line.

(From left, Larry Bagby as Marshall Grant, Joaquin Phoenix as Johnny Cash and Dan John Miller as Luther Perkins in the Larry Mangold movie Walk the Line).

The absence of success as a door-to-door salesman as a means of supporting his family, in part, led Cash to seek an audition with a small band for Sam Phillips, the owner of Sun Records. While Cash, Luther Perkins and Marshall Grant first aimed to play gospel music, it was Folsom Prison Blues that won the trio a contract and financial success. Among others, the three would begin touring with Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins, as portrayed respectively by Waylon Payne, Tyler Hilton and John Holiday. Dallas Roberts portrayed Sam Phillips.

(From left, Robert Patrick as Ray Cash and Shelby Lynne as Carrie Cash in the Larry Mangold movie Walk the Line).

The touring introduces Johnny Cash to June Carter, as portrayed by Reese Witherspoon. The influence Carter has on Johnny Cash is a source of friction for Vivian Cash. Feelings of love develop between the pair, though attempts from Johnny to initiate a romantic relationship with June are initially rebuffed. A large portion of the film is dedicated to this dynamic, the children between the separate marriages for the pair, and the familial drama that remains between Ray and Johnny Cash. The eventual intimacy, drug and alcohol overuse by Johnny, an eventful Thanksgiving on that path, and a dynamic journey to ultimately get there provides depth to the personal story that is told by Walk the Line.

(From left, director James Mangold, actor Joaquin Phoenix and actress Reese Witherspoon in the James Mangold movie Walk the Line).

Walk the Line is well crafted entertainment with a strong underlying narrative. The drama is true to the music style of June Carter and Johnny Cash, with feelings of love and social norms of the larger society factoring into the tale. Learning more about the music and the biography of the early part of Cash’s family and career was worthy of my time, too. I rate Walk the Line as directed by James Mangold at 4.0-stars on a scale of one-to-five.

Matt – Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Bruce Springsteen and the album ‘Tunnel of Love’

Maybe I am a touch of a romantic. Perhaps the truest, saddest album ever put out by the boss, an album specifically billed as a solo effort by Bruce Springsteen, I offer a look at the eighth studio album by Bruce Springsteen, namely Tunnel of Love. The album itself, one that tells the emotional story of the emotional pratfalls for a marriage that ends in divorce, may be an absolutely odd offering two days before the holiday known as Valentine’s Day. Enjoy this ride with the songs, which will play in response to the linked song names that follow.

(The album cover for the album Tunnel of Love by Bruce Springsteen).

Ain’t Got You opens the album Tunnel of Love with a stripped down, Bo Diddley rhythm and blues beat. Bruce is pining for love perhaps out of reach. Per the website Song Facts based in Connecticut, Springsteen recorded this song at home by himself while his marriage was on the rocks.

A song never released as a single in the United States, Tougher Than the Rest follows the opening ditty. The E Street Band backs up the boss’ a rockabilly sensibility slowed to a more methodical pacing that almost approaches ballad. I sense a Roy Orbison feel in where the production landed. The emotion and lyrics of the song coupled lends the music here a willingness to see about love if, yes if, the dance partner Bruce receiving the song can reciprocate the feeling.

All That Heaven Will Allow offers an upbeat cadence into laying “bare the hope and fear of a man in love,” per Rolling Stone magazine. Musically, the song combines the percussion of Ain’t Got You with the emotion and remaining sound of Tougher Than the Rest as a launching point. As a testimonial of the male heart seeking love, All That Heaven Will Allow speaks truth.

(A live edition of the single for All That Heaven Will Allow by Bruce Springsteen).

Spare Parts is a direct and unabashed aim at a rock song told with the flare of an old fashioned country song. Lacking the lyrical subtlety of other songs, the narrative thread of Spare Parts offers life as it happens, the panic and fear driving a lack of responsibility, and the way ladies suffer with unaided support and broken hearts in the face of that.

Introspection as an answer to reckless youth reflects the answer Cautious Man gives to succumbing to fear in Spare Parts. Like with All That Heaven Will Allow, the bitter head of the vulnerability of love and fear is present (with tattoos), though this time in the notion of an existing marriage. The give and take of the inner turmoil seems to land on risking the hurt for the payoff of love through the recognition of “the beauty of God’s fallen light.”

Walk Like a Man, in ending the first side of the album Tunnel of Love, invokes the boy inside the man at the point committing to lifelong love (marriage) comments. The song can be taken as invoking the son’s relationship with his father as he, the son, gets married. The vulnerability of the relationship between son and father as the son steps into a new commitment with his wife, the layers at play here invoke much.

(The back cover of the album Tunnel of Love by Bruce Springsteen).

The song Tunnel of Love, the second single released from the album after Brilliant Disguise, incorporates several E Street Band members. Bruce’s future wife Patti Scialfa offers backing vocals, too. The central metaphor for the song Tunnel of Love invokes a carnival ride as the larger feelings of marriage. I note the power of this metaphor in not invoking a roller coaster as that metaphor.

Two Faces returns to the notion of the false confidence inexperience in love brings to the notion of love. The song juxtaposes the playful organ sound of a carousel with the sadness of a dirge. The song presented to me a romantic notion of the flourish of love in a marriage followed by the emotion of a destroyed love when marriage comes to an end.

Brilliant Disguise offers the perhaps most uniquely, lyrically Bruce take on a love song on the whole album. Expressing self-doubt in love, the song is perhaps the quintessential breakup song for the marriage that ended soon after the album’s release. Getting into notions of whether Bruce and his first wife, Julianne Phillips, could be truthful with themselves or their partner in their marriage. The vulnerability, the truth, and that things didn’t work … the emotional truth of this song is rare. Brilliant Disguise is the best song of the whole album for me.

(The single for Brilliant Disguise by Bruce Springsteen).

One Step Up reflects the third single released from the Tunnel of Love album. Bruce and his second wife, Patti, are the only members of the E Street Band on the song. The car, the furnace, the church bells, and the birds not functioning in the song metaphorically tell the story of broken relationship parts from the ending marriage of Bruce and Julianne. The emotional truth of the song makes for another winner for the album.

The song When You’re Alone is the full blown relationship’s over dirge of Tunnel of Love. The song is about moving on, grieving, and the odd pace for when memories, good and bad, will come back. Breaking up may be hard to do, and Tunnel of Love spent ten songs getting us there. When You’re Alone gets into what’s next.

Valentine’s Day feels like the grief song, the saddest song, of the Tunnel of Love album. The metaphorical carnival ride of marriage has come to an end; husband and wife aren’t anymore, and the house is no longer home. That the tenor and feel of the song is played as a country song, a form that speaks sadness more than many, ends the story of divorce with mourning.

My sincere take is that the album Tunnel of Love took some unfair lumps as a follow-up album to the album Born in the U.S.A. by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. The truth and honesty of a divorce album, especially with that truth, means Tunnel of Love deserves a better reputation. I completely love this album, which is why the songs are shared within this review.

Matt – Wednesday, February 12, 2020

Bruce Springsteen and the album ‘Born to Run’

Bruce Springsteen has long been a critical favorite in the music world.  He first came onto the scene in 1973, beginning with Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. and The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle, for which Springsteen penned and sung both, reflecting a folk rock, soul, and rhythm-and-blues influences. Fans of Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Stax Records would be comfortable here.  In August 2002, I would see Springsteen play with the E Street Band for the first time, as Bruce and the band came to my hometown.

A March of 2012 readers poll in Rolling Stone magazine revealed a top ten listing of favorite Springsteen albums, with Born To Run earning top billing.  The album chronicles Springsteen’s foray from modest suburban musician with players to match to professional, big music sounds in what would be third, make-or-break album. As he would for a full career, Springsteen again wrote the songs. He would bid farewell to a romanticized teenage street life with warmth and humor that gave way to bitterness.

(The album Born To Run by Bruce Springsteen).

Born To Run starts off with “Thunder Road,” a desperate love song about Mary, her boyfriend, and their last chance at making something real.  The song itself is named for the Robert Mitchum film Thunder Road (1958), which Springsteen never saw, and references the Roy Orbison song Only The Lonely.

While the title phrase is not used until mid-song, the slow introduction of the song with Roy Bittan‘s quiet piano and Springsteen’s harmonica. As mentioned in the documentary Wings for Wheels: The Making of ‘Born to Run’ (2005), that slow start is a welcoming for the album and song. The tenor saxophone of Clarence Clemons and Fender Rhodes of Bittan in duet to close the song is magic.

The album then leads into “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out,” a song about the formation of the E Street Band. The song’s title or meaning never really become clear, though Springsteen himself is the clear protagonist in bringing the band together, as well as bringing long-time band (and now deceased) saxophonist Clarence Clemons into the fold.  Steven Van Zandt is credited with the idea leading to the opening horn introduction’s composition.

“Night” is a song for it’s exciting, romantic quality of blue collar workers seeking the escape of drag racing after work while searching for love. The song is played using Phil Spector‘s Wall of Sound technique, and previews the song Born To Run later on this album by getting using a blue collar protagonist.

“Backstreets” has been interpreted in two main ways. In his biography Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen states the song is about a broken friendship. The other interpretation, given the gender ambiguous name Terry, interprets the song as depicting a homosexual relationship. The representation as an intense, platonic, and faded friendship between two men is where my vote on meaning rests.

“Born To Run” is a love letter written in song form to a girl named Wendy, with the passion of love coupled with the passion to get out of Monmouth, New Jersey. The blue collar desire of leaving the realities of life behind are full blown on sale in this homage to hot rod racing, the craving for passion and girls, and the seeking of relief. This song lands at the 21st greatest song on a 2011 Rolling Stone magazine listing of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

“She’s the One” gives us the rock staple of an intensely felt attraction to a cold-hearted woman who causes massive emotional turmoil for her lover. The reality of his lover’s lies are apparent to the protagonist singer, though he craves love so much that he cannot accept the logic his heart simply knows cannot be real. The song is reminiscent of the rhythm-and-blues beat of Bo Diddley, which really resonates for us.

Meeting Across the River might not seem to fit among the other music of the Born To Run album, owing to the soft, haunting trumpet of Randy Becker and double bass from jazz veteran Richard Davis.  The lyrical song faces a reality low-level criminality while bridging the listener from She’s the One to Jungleland. The singer asks Eddie for the money to get into New York City from New Jersey, with consequences of failure from his girlfriend hanging in the balance after hocking his girlfriend’s radio. Whether after a drug deal or a theft isn’t clear from the song, the singer thinks the promise of a payday from his criminality are enough to make his girlfriend stay.

The album closes with the pessimistic “Jungleland,” which begins like much of the remainder of the album with a sense of despair and defeat. Having Rat again drive a car across the state line from New Jersey to New York to meet a presumably pregnant lady, aiming for romance with the consequences of previous acts looming large. Rat’s criminal conflicts with police share further despair, finally coming to climax after the saxophone solo with death of Rat’s dreams of love and life as gunned down in a tunnel. The slow, methodical tempo of the song makes Jungleland a frequent pairing with Meeting Across the River in concert.

Born To Run is a clear fan favorite of Bruce Springsteen, whether solo, with the E Street Band, or in other permutations Springsteen has taken through his career. Born in the U.S.A. is the larger commercial success for Bruce Springsteen, though Born To Run remains the fan favorite.  The album is approachable, accessible, and consistently blue collar in perspective. The album resonates for me, still, with the album having been released roughly seven months after my birth.

Matt – Saturday, July 27, 2019

Blue Velvet is a shocking, shocking movie

Blue Velvet is a shocking, shocking movie. The desperation, exploitation, voyeurism, and flat out frightening sense of brokenness at times made this movie an uncomfortable one for me.

Matt Lynn Digital has a friend that lives near the airport, referenced once before in the Matt Lynn Digital blog about Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. Our airport friend ranks Blue Velvet (1986) as his eighth ranked film out of ten.

Blue Velvet Director and screenwriter is talented and distinctive director David Lynch. Oscar Award nominated for best director with Blue Velvet, The Elephant Man (1980), and Mulholland Drive (2001), this movie delivers perhaps the most forthright example of a director quickly hitting you with different deeply felt reactions one upon another upon another still. The powerful scenes of great emotion and, in some cases, significant artistry are meritorious.

Is Blue Velvet powerful? Sure. Redeeming in a way that resonated with me? I wish that I could say yes. That is to say that I am more of the Roger Ebert camp than of the Gene Siskel camp with regards to their At the Movies review of Blue Velvet (1986).

This siding with the feeling of Roger Ebert is to say that while I recognize the power of hurting the Isabella Rossellini character with full nudity on the sheriff’s front lawn, the pain I felt in her treatment there was intended to hurt and shame her as a character and actress more than it was to make a statement geared at redeeming some larger quality in Dorothy Vallens.

The larger commentary that Lynch may have been after in stating that everyone has darkness was lost in some way with the campiness that works better for a movie like Pulp Fiction, for example. The scene where Dean Stockwell plays Ben using a prop to daydream into the singing of Roy Orbison‘s “In Dreams” seemed like a throw away scene for me. Even the ritualized rape of Vallens by Frank Booth (played by Dennis Hopper) seemed to lack a seriousness of treatment that such a thing deserves.

Alternatives to the attempted lighter fare that might have helped me could have included sticking more closely to the voyeurism storylines of Sandy Williams (played by Laura Dern) or Jeffrey Beaumont (played by Kyle MacLachlan). The pain that the treatment accorded to Dorothy Vallens and Sandy Williams in Blue Velvet seemed cruel in a way that lacked nuance of its own accord, or seriousness in tone considering the remainder of the storytelling. The constant assault of jokes around wood with regards to Lumberton did not help.

I respect the opinion of my airport friend in appreciating the quality of this film. I tend to agree that David Lynch brought forth a thought provoking examination of light versus dark, hope versus those more cynical impulses that dwell under the surface. Offering contrasts of up and down, more comical versus more repugnant, of curiosity versus experience, are quality questions to have raised. Lynch did so in a style that was uniquely his own, and for this I find praise. The bottom line is that I may not be the ideal audience for Blue Velvet. Blue Velvet is a shocking, shocking movie.

Matt – Tuesday, February 28, 2017