Nashville About.com review of "Walk the line"

For months, I've looked forward to the release of "Walk The Line," the story of Johnny Cash & June Carter.
One really had to feel for Reese Witherspoon in her appearance on Letterman several months ago when she was there to promote her movie, "Just Like Heaven," but Letterman seemed to continually focus back on "Walk The Line." He'd already seen the movie and was bouncing out of his seat about the film.

Witherspoon,in her mind, knew that come November she would be making the talk show rounds again to promote "Walk The Line" and having to start that early would tire her discussions of it way before the release date was here.

Same with Joaquin Phoenix who began to just revert to crazy topics just because he was tired of answering the same questions over and over again. I'm sure that everywhere the two have gone, that's all that people have wanted to discuss because both do give tremendous performances in the film.

As you enter the theater, the intended goal for James Mangold (Producer) is that he wanted to interpret the story, not imitate the story. With that in mind, Witherspoon is a lot softer than Carter. Witherspoon has admitted to be a girly girl and with films like Legally Blonde and Sweet Home Alabama, no one is going to argue that fact. There was a brassiness to Carter, that few would be able to pull off.

When Witherspoon was in the fourth grade, she portrayed Mother Maybelle Carter in Country Music History - remember she is a native of Nashville. That she would grow up to play the lead in a film as the daughter of the Carter Family matriarch was probably far from her imagination. Witherspoon grew up wanting to be a country singer, but when Mangold came to her and requested that she sing in the film she was horrified. Witherspoon had already signed all of the contracts necessary though and when Mangold asked her to just try it, she agreed.

Following six months of vocal coaching from Roger Love, she was ready. You're not going to hear someone that sounds just as Carter, or Cash, but the idea is there that you are watching the way they may have interacted then together when they met and became friends. Carter's marriage to Carl Smith is touched on lightly mainly referring to their marriage only through conversation which is also the same with Carter's second marriage to a police officer, Edwin "Rip" Nix, who was referred to in the film as a stock car driver.

They also lightly touch on Carter's experience as a songwriter, and actually not really enough. When they get to the point that she's writing "Ring of Fire," her co-writer Merle Kilgore is inadvertently left out. It may seem minor to some, but I can't imagine that's the way Carter-Cash would've wanted it. Even if they didn't want to cast the part, his presence in the writing process should've at least been mentioned in some capacity.

It is impressive to realize that prior to the film, neither had any musical ability. However by the end of the six-month training process Witherspoon had learned to play the autoharp along with eight songs and Phoenix learned to play the guitar and twenty-two songs. Each night before filming, instead of getting extra sleep, Phoenix was practicing the music that he would have to play the next day on film.

The image that most have of Cash is a figure larger than life. In 2000, Phoenix was in a film opposite Russell Crowe - "Gladiator." Cash admired the performance Phoenix gave and expressed his admiration by inviting the actor over for dinner.

Following dinner, as he picked up his guitar, Cash said that he wanted to wait for June so he could get his nerve up before singing himself. That vulnerability comes through in Phoenix's performance of Cash on film and is the way he chose to present Cash to the viewing audience. That vulnerable side causes one to realize why Carter chose to not walk away from Cash when she very well could have.

To read more of this review Click Here