There are a lot of movies about the lives of musicians. These can be based on real artists (Johny Cash (Walk the line), Edith Piaf (La môme), Ray Charles (Ray)) or made up (Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story). This movie is about a made up character, the artist Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges), an old musician who is experiencing the fall of his career.
He’s performing in small bars and bowling alleys and doesn’t write any new songs any more. He also has an alcohol addiction.
Both Jeff Bridges and Colin Farrell have sung themselves in this movie, which actually sounds pretty good.
With a bit of googling i found out that Jeff Bridges actually released an album in 2000:
He really is excellent in his role. He just is Bad Blake, a country singer with issues. It all just feels so natural, not like he is acting. He really is excellent.
Unfortunately the story does not manage to keep up with the great acting. It’s just what you would expect from a movie like this with no surprise plot twists. The difficult situations he has to go through could have been fleshed out more.
Score: 7