Walk the Line | Review

Mangold’s straightforward approach focuses on the “muse” in music.

It makes the world go round, it can be prescribed as a medicine to heal the soul and it sometimes mends a broken heart, but it also acts as a great instrument in surviving a crappy childhood behind and to make a Miss into a Mrs. Music and love are the driving forces of this biopic on the man they called J.R and the Man in Black. What the Oscars did for last year’s Ray will probably repeat itself with this drama, and apart from the year’s prettiest poster design, Walk the Line has got some fine vocal cords via a no longer underrated actor in Joaquin Phoenix.

Based on a pair of accurate book autobiographies, Gill Dennis and director James Mangold co-script a “safe” biography, demons wrestle with the film’s hero but the love story remedy suppresses a full out dark drug and alcohol addiction tale, which also means a full proof method to get audiences packing the houses. Flashback from Folsom Prison in 1968 to childhood trauma, the Johnny Cash story goes through the typical loops of how the singer gets his groove on – the recording experience, buying his first house, marriage failure, fame & fortune and accompanying descent into the tortured life of a singer. It’s all a predictable path but unlike a VH1 special – Mangold’s script pushes for a full auditory movie soundtrack assault and doesn’t rest solely on states of drug paranoia.

Whether cinephiles will be familiar with Memphis sound or legendary singer in Cash is irrelevant, it’s fairly difficult not to appreciate the various concert scenes and stages set-ups and the power of an actor’s vocal talents, – even Witherspoon gets into the game using her own pipes for her take on June Carter. These performances eat up a lot of the film’s run time, but there is not one instance where such scenes come across as staged – the tone is an appropriate one, music numbers are well-placed throughout and Phoenix honestly captures and embodies the spirit of the Cash persona. The film’s romantic tale is lite, yet strangely poignant, and while it doesn’t match the contact levels of The Notebook, there is a nice sense that as the ring’s of fire burns so does that burning desire. In hindsight, the passion that is configured into the pic seems to have been created with the notion that the strong bound between the two stars was the groundwork for a connection that lasted 35 years and which probably had something to do with how June and Cash died months apart.

Put aside Phoenix’s mighty performance and hauntingly real-life resemblance to Cash’s own voice and strut, the film never reaches for the bottom of the barrel and nor is there a strong stylistic sense, somehow an imagined 70’s Altman-esque approach could have been added more mystery to the Cash character. Instead Mangold’s approach is a little too modest, while facts about the person and the music are injected it hardly explains the aura of Cash – basically leaving viewers to see how well Phoenix and Witherspoon can play Cash and Carter. After Mangold’s Cop Land, Walk the Line is gold record status for the filmmaker, but if you want to know more about what made Cash such an icon, skip the movie and buy a couple of “Best of” albums instead and listen attentively.

Rating 2 stars