The trailer for “Crazy Heart” has arrived and as many have noted, it’s got a “Rocky” or “The Wrestler” vibe mixed in with the “Tender Mercies”country film milieu it probably emulates to a degree. The film stars Jeff Bridges as a down and out aging country star trying to get his life together, Maggie Gyllenhaal as the reporter who falls for him, Colin Farrell as the young country star (who barely appears in the trailer and doesn’t even get a solo screen credit) and Robert Duvall as Bridges’ father.
Here’s the official synopsis:
Four-time Academy Award® nominee JEFF BRIDGES stars as the richly comic, semi-tragic romantic anti-hero Bad Blake in the debut feature film CRAZY HEART from writer-director Scott Cooper. Bad Blake is a broken-down, hard-living country music singer who’s had way too many marriages, far too many years on the road and one too many drinks way too many times. And yet, Bad can’t help but reach for salvation with the help of Jean (Golden Globe® Nominee MAGGIE GYLLENHAAL), a journalist who discovers the real man behind the musician. As he struggles down the road of redemption, Bad learns the hard way just how tough life can be on one man’s crazy heart.
The thing about his last minute movie joining the Oscar race that aggravates a little is it… changes things. Ok, hopefully Jeff Bridges is as good as everyone says and if so, great. But even if he’s half-decent maybe he’ll win cause he’ll get the sympathetic, “he’s been in Hollywood for how long without an Oscar? vote. And really, of what we’ve seen so far this year, Colin Firth deserves the Oscar for “A Single Man,” but politics will always figure in the end. That’s not to say we’re discounting it or rooting against it. On the contrary, it looks good, has a soulful, humanist vibe (not unlike “The Wrestler” as many have noted) and boasts a score by T. Bone Burnett (what we can hear in the trailer is pretty damn good).
“Crazy Heart” is in theaters December 16, 2009
Watch it in HD at Apple.
