Honkytonk Man

It took a lot of nerve in the early eighties,in the days of Rocky,Indiana Jones and "fame" to portray such a human wreck.Eastwood's character recalls Hank Williams,one of the few country singers whose songs experimented tragedy ("I'll never get out of this world alive"). The difference lies in the fact that the singer here will remain an obscure artist.

A road movie,it features an interesting boy character who learns the harsh realities of life.In the short space of a couple of days,he will have experimented love (first in a brothel,then probably later with the girl they met along the road) and death (he'll have to cope with a burial).The young female "singer" they -reluctantly-take with them provides the movie with the comic relief it does need:you should hear her sing "My bonnie" in a shrill voice.

The ballads Eastwood sings are moving and tuneful(I don't know if he is dubbed for them,but anyway it's made with taste and respect for the audience).The audition is the highlight of the movie,Eastwood seems to sing as if it were a matter of life and death(and it is anyway).The actor/director avoids pathos and melodrama.Once again,it was a very risky move to play such a character at a time when success story was the golden rule.The movie was bound to be a flop,but it deserves to be restored to favor now.

Despite almost every critic I've read, I think this is a real gem by Clint Eastwood. A honest, sensitive effort in the road movie tradition. The minor tone, the naive sequences soothe Red Stovall's journey to his fate. The movie also displays a touching view of the depression era in USA. Like animated Roy Emerson Stryker's pictures the photography is remarkable as well as the sound track. I've learned about lots of singers and musicians that recorded only to give a final testimony of their art. I guess stories like these deserved a movie like Honkytonk Man. Long life to Clint, one of the most underrated talents not only in Hollywood but in the rest of the world.

This film is one of Eastwood´s most compelling and strikes you right at the heart. It tells us a story with such a warmth and compassion about a theme as old as America itself. It is about a man and his love for his nephew, his music and his his desire to make a name for himself before his TB´ll end it all. Though Clint´s voice isn´t the best it does however strengthen our understanding of the motivation of a man that is running against time in a setting that is both harsh and unforgiving. The movie´s depiction of the depression is outstanding and the songs are stupendous. Watch for Marty Robbins who also sings half the theme song. All in all an outstanding movie that will stay in your heart for a long, long time...

The critics didn't like this film, but I beg to differ. Perhaps I'm naive and gullible, but to me it rings true in its local color and the coping of poor people in the Depression amidst the aspirations of young and old alike.

My father, a published author in a small way, once mused to me that if he were to write a novel, it would be about someone trying to come to terms with his own mediocrity. Such is the theme of this movie, and hardly typical a consideration it is in a time when the media bombard us coast to coast, for our adulation, with the glamorous images of a mere handful of individuals who happen to have landed vast fame and fortune. What does any of this have to do with most of us? On the one hand, we live day to day. On the other, a recurring dream whispers "maybe..."

Knowing that he is living on borrowed time, Red, humble and hand-to-mouth but respected more than he knows by a few somewhat more successful colleagues (and an unusually fallible and vulnerable character for Eastwood, which he plays well) is granted, in extremis, an apparent opportunity to reach for the stars. More down-to-earth, he is also fortuitously blessed/burdened with not just one but two young proteges: first his nephew, then also a girl at loose ends. Perhaps neither is particularly talented; nevertheless both have a claim on his attention which he reluctantly fulfills in his own unassuming way, while making no exalted pretenses as to their prospects. When on his deathbed he can do no more for them, he commends them to each other. "You take care of her, now" he rasps to Whit. "She's okay. Help her with her singing." While they may never reach celebrity, the texture of life can sustain them if they face it together.

As, dying and perhaps delirious, he gazes up into Marlene's face, he sees the "raw-boned Okie woman" he had loved for several years as a mistress, and whom he later had regretted leaving. She had borne a girl whom he had never met. Marlene was a fatherless waif of about the right age. Did he recognize at the last moment his long-lost daughter? It is a question which the film leaves hanging in the air. Does genealogy matter? In practical terms, that is what she became almost too late.

For my money, it's a raw-boned, American Okie "La Boheme."

As with most movies i prefer to read professional critics after viewing,although i do sometimes read them first. Frankly as a retired sound man i do not allow critics to influence me either way. This movie with (my first viewing of a Clint family member)Kyle succeeded in roller coasting emotion from humour to unsentimental portrayals of all the cast. I looked out for Marty Robbins, whose name was referred to as the one (albeit brief) sole touching moment in the film. It was undoubtedly a touching moment, but certainly not the only one. The entire theme was skillfully intertwined with some really great songs and lyrics. This is another DVD I will add to my collection. A movie to watch, and even learn from, as to how humanity can be humble and unpretentious with subtlety, warmth and understated aggression. Clint is understandably angry, and we feel real sympathy for his place in the world he inhabits.