1983 - Tender Mercies

Well, look at this. Thanks to the downtime I've had during this LA trip, this will be my third post in a week, a feat I haven't achieved in about 6 or 7 years. And there'll be more to come, too, as I prepare to attend a screening of one of the other nominees in this current review year. More on that in the next post.

For now, we begin our look at the 1983 Best Picture contest with...


Tender Mercies
Director:
Bruce Beresford
Screenplay:
Horton Foote
Starring:
Robert Duvall, Tess Harper, Betty Buckley, Wilford Brimley, Ellen Barkin, Allan Hubbard, Lenny von Dohlen, Paul Gleason
Academy Awards:
5 nominations
2 wins, including Best Actor (Duvall)

Ex-country singer Mac Sledge (Duvall) finds himself in a small town motel in remote Texas after a drunken binge. The widowed owner, Rosa Lee (Harper), takes pity on Mac and accepts his offer to work for her in exchange for room and board. The two soon fall for each other and later marry, but his idyllic new life is disrupted when his ex-wife, Dixie (Buckley), also a country singer, tours nearby. Old wounds are reopened and Mac struggles to determine what he really wants out of life.

Tender Mercies is certainly not afraid to take its time. It's a slow-paced slice-of-life story, and since it takes place in a slow town, that leisurely pace feels somehow comfortable, never gratuitous. The beautiful scenery doesn't hurt, either. All in all, it's a sweet story, though it could be argued it's a little too simple. Not that nothing happens. The plot moves forward just fine, but the conflicts aren't quite as profound as they could be. We never really see Mac's worst alcoholic behaviour since he sobers up near the beginning of the film. And the tension he previously caused with his ex-wife when he was at his worst is not explored deeply enough, for my liking.

Winning the Best Actor Oscar for this role, Robert Duvall impresses not just with his acting chops but, holy crap, he has a nice set of pipes, too. Plus, he wrote a couple of the songs that he sings in the movie! The supporting cast are also expertly natural and subdued, matching the overall tone (with the possible exception of the child actors). Some standouts are Wilford Brimley as the exhausted music manager and a young Ellen Barkin (pictured) as Mac's estranged daughter. There's also a brief appearance by character actor Paul Gleason, famed for playing everybody's favourite 1980s movie assholes.