Crazy Good

This evening I went to Crazy Heart and came home to Sam's crazy chicken in time to meet crazy Nihar at the corner bar. Crazy Heart was crazy good. I'm trying to live by the theme of it, "give love another try" like I'm trying to live by "carpe diem," simple mottos that ain't always so easy. I see why this film is such a hit, so touted for the great acting. I was very skeptical, didn't expect to like it at all. It's probably Maggie Gyllenhall (a present crush because of interviews) that made me go see it. But it's really Jeff Bridges' Bad Blake (and Colin Firth's Tommy Sweet, for that matter) that makes this film great. And the script and the music- it's just a great story that is completely believable and relatable.

MG acts first like a therapist and she's also super sexy from the start. Bad Blake thinks she's too good for him. He is enchanted with her classiness (and her youth?). She gets all shy and bashful, which was for me off-putting. I mean, really? This old scruffy dude complaining about his hemorrhoids is that intimidating to you? I didn't expect to, but I totally bought their love story, it made perfect sense. It's chemistry that draws them to each other, like it always is, and they have it.

Just as important as the love story, the struggling musician story, the buddy story, and indeed central to the story as a whole, is Bad's struggle with alcoholism. It's good to see alcoholism portrayed humanly, as the fatal disease, the killer that it is. I've seen a few friends struggle with this disease and it's heartbreaking how it destroys lives, just as it does here. When Bad calls his friend Wayne and says, "I wanna be sober," it's a moment of great triumph, but with a deep breath in anticipation of the long road ahead. In that sense the ending was very real too. But I won't spoil it for you...

Here's Sam's Crazy Chicken! Yum.