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Walk the Line November 20, 2005 |
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Johnny Cash cynically, cheekily utters the already famous line from “Walk the Line” on the eve of his great late ‘60’s comeback. While negotiating a live recording at the maximum security Folsom Prison with the execs of Columbia Records, a lawyer looks at Cash and wonders, “why the black, you look like you’re going to a funeral.” Cash, attempting to regain his fame, and fortune, after nearly a decade of pill induced decline and personal setbacks, looks the guy over with his cool bravado and suggests, “maybe I am.” It’s the one clip you’ve seen on all the ads and talk shows, and it’s easily quotable, because if “At Folsom Prison” hadn’t worked, if it hadn’t gone on to sell briskly, opening the doors to the blockbuster three-million unit selling “At San Quentin”, Cash’s already burned out flame might really have died forever. But the recording, a raucous set of country rock blistering with energy and Cash’s irreplaceable deep Southern growl, worked on so many levels, financially, of course, but ultimately symbolically, as one solitary moment in time when the famous outlaw of country rock, down on his luck, not only regained that spark that made him famous in the first place, but provided his core fan base – poverty row denizens and prisoners – with a glorious hour of fun and music. Music buffs know “At Folsom Prison” is one of the most important live albums in the history of 20th century music, and it’s often regarded as Cash’s gold standard recording, so it’s no surprise that “Walk the Line”, a strict Cash bio, beginning at age 10, and ending 24 years later, with the comeback, makes the prison concert the framing device in which to spin the rocky story of one of our greatest, most unique singing stars, and his dogged pursuit of music fame, fortune, respect, and true love, all of which come hard to handle for the troubled Man in Black. Joaquin Phoenix plays Cash from his late teens in the Army, pining over country-western magazine cover girl June Carter (Reese Witherspoon), and slowly learning how to master the art of guitar strumming and song writing, through his ‘50’s triumphant Sun Records years and eventual pill addiction, like a man yearning to be heard, and when he is, like a man quick to throw it all away. Sex, drugs, and rock ‘n ‘ roll are common in bio-pics about rebellious, drug-addicted stars who flame out under the pressures of stardom, but “Walk the Line” isn’t gratuitous in the hedonistic ways of Cash’s burnout; sure it shows him sleeping with zealous groupies, downing pills with the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley, and destroying his dressing room in a fit of rage, but the main story of the film, running parallel with the historical music stuff, is Johnny’s torment at the constant rejection of the twice-divorced Carter, whose imagine in the Christian goody-goody singing Carter family is of the black sheep to fans who find divorce a sin. “I just went through a terrible divorce,” she pleads to Cash, who is reluctant to give up, despite his wife and kids at home, “and I’ve got a world of judgment on me right now.” Because of the rejection, which seems harsh considering it’s apparent that she loves him, Cash becomes more and more unstable, coming to one Las Vegas show so intoxicated that he forgets the words to his own song, eventually crashing to the stage in a haze of confusion and anger. The story suggests that he couldn’t handle the rejections from his beautiful singing partner so he collapsed into pills and alcohol, ruining the tour, and his finances, but it’s all a rich tapestry of dysfunction, starting with his unloving father (Robert Patrick), his busted marriage to his high school sweetheart (Ginnifer Goodwin), and his haunted memories of an eternally good brother who was killed in a freak wood cutting accident as a boy, creating a distance between his already bitter father that carries well into adulthood. It would be easy to go the comparison route and list the numerous ways “Walk the Line” resembles last year’s “Ray”, right down to the lead actor’s uncanny ability to recreate a famous icon for fictionalization purposes, but director James Mangold’s film is good enough to warrant a review based solely on its merits alone, and those merits, indeed, start with Joaquin Phoenix. Not only did Phoenix learn to play the guitar from scratch, but he performs all of the singing himself, a remarkable fact when you consider how recognizable, and unique Johnny Cash’s voice was. Anybody can do an Elvis or Sinatra impersonation, but to nail Cash’s deep Southern voice to perfection is an impressive feat, and should rival fellow celebrity interpreter Philip Seymour Hoffman’s “Capote” masterpiece for the rights to this year’s Best Actor Oscar. Likewise, Witherspoon does all of her own playing and singing as June Carter, but her performance is more in tune with the emotions of a woman reluctant to get involved with a wild man, despite mutual attraction, and for it, the character is often cold and hard to accept, yet the performance is no less remarkable; it’s one of the actress’s most grown up roles, and her best performance since “Election”. The greatness of the music, supervised by T-Bone Burnett, is a given, and Mangold’s professionally sturdy direction, and Phedon Papamichel’s (“Sideways”) gorgeous cinematography, mixes well with the brilliant performances, making the 140-minute “Walk the Line” an acceptable installment in the fruitful history of rock star biographies, filled with temperament, glory, disillusion, and finally, musically and spiritually, splendidly realized redemption. “Walk the Line” is playing at the Movie-Plex 59. by Adam Suraf
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