Kelly Canter is a Country & Western Superstar who got so drunk one night she fell off the stage causing her to have a miscarriage and ending up in rehab. Whilst in recovery she meets and falls for a young attendant Beau, who is also an aspiring country singer/songwriter. When James, her manipulating husband/manager insists that Kelly check herself out and get back on the road Touring he hires Beau to be an Opening Act for the show and also to keep an eye on Kelly to see she doesn’t slip back into bad habits. James, a cold fish of a man, also hires Chiles, a pretty young ex-beauty queen as a singer too presumably to make her the next big thing in and out of his bed … but with the plot getting more muddled by the minute, we are never really sure what is going on with that.
This ill-conceived badly written melodrama never draws you in emotional and frankly you end up not caring less if Kelly gets wasted again … in fact there are moments in the 2 hours you wish you had smuggled a flask into the theater to have a nip yourself to make this pap more passable.
Even as Kelly, Gwyneth Paltrow still looks and acts every inch like the superstar that she is even though she’s not helped with this script: Tim McGraw as the James is so totally bland he’s either got the role off to a tee, or as I suspect, this is the best he can do: I still cannot decide if Leighton Meester, who played Chiles, was meant to be as annoying as she was. The real delight however was Garrett Hedlund who got his role as Beau pitch perfect and was also so convincing as a country performer, and I was even more impressed when I later read that he had never ever sung or played a guitar before. My research also told me that Tim McGraw (James) who is a major county star, coached him, so what a pity that Mr. Hedlund didn’t return the compliment and help Mr. McGraw to learn how to act.
Roger Eberts, one of my favourite Critics, summed this movie up so perfectly by declaring that he it was a throwback to a different cinematic era and sincerely believed it would have been one of the best movies ……in 1957 ….. with Lee Remick in the lead. And he’s so right.
R.T.V. For Miss Paltrow in sparkly skanky dresses, and for the music, but mostly for handsome and talented Garrett who is the one to watch. (P.S. In his next project a movie based on Jack Kerouac’s ‘On The Road’ he plays Dean Moriaty ….perfect casting).
★★★★★
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