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‘Country Strong’ shamelessly piles on the clichés

By Lori Hoffman

Add Comment | Comments: 0 | Posted Jan. 12, 2011

Before we commence with this review, I want to inform you that I am a big fan of country music, so this assessment is not coming from a country music hater. That said, I’m a film critic first and beyond enjoying a lot of the music in Country Strong, it had me cringing.

The people who hate country music could use Country Strongas the prime example of why they can’t stand it. The plot is like a bad country song that just wants to pile on the heartbreak and the clichés. But even if you travel the same path as previous movies, you can make it work if the characters walking the line are compelling.

In Country Strong , written and directed by Shana Feste, those characters are stick figures without an emotional connection. Gwyneth Paltrow stars in Country Strong as Kelly Canter, a country music legend of Reba proportions who has slipped into the abyss of alcohol addiction and is trying to get clean in rehab. Unfortunately, she is doing about as well as Lindsay Lohan, including having a fling with an orderly, Beau (Garrett Hedlund), a budding country singer-songwriter.

Kelly’s husband/manager James (Tim McGraw) pulls his wife out of rehab prematurely to get her back performing, a move calculated to make him seem like a jerk and Beau as a nice guy who really cares about her. That’s the idea, but basically Beau is taking advantage of a vulnerable woman to further his music career no matter how many times Feste tries to show Beau’s loving, compassionate nature with dewy-eyed close-ups. Much like her husband, he is using Kelly as a meal ticket.

Tossed into this mix is Chiles (Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester), another budding singer-songwriter who allegedly has talent, but can get rattled in front of an audience. A former beauty queen contestant, she takes it as a compliment when Beau tells her she looks like a country Barbie.

These are the satellites whirling around Kelly, who can’t get a grip on her life as the booze beckons and she tries to mount her comeback without much enthusiasm. Still shattered by the death of her unborn child after an alcohol-related accident, she is not ready to get back to work but there would be no movie if she didn’t try.

The music is the only saving grace in this film, in particular the title track which showcases Paltrow’s considerable singing ability. It seems like an awful waste to make a country-music film co-starring Tim McGraw and not have him sing, although he does have one song on the soundtrack. Unfortunately, the character he is asked to play is strictly a one-note cardboard cliché and McGraw, who does have acting skills, can’t salvage the role.

Paltrow has her moments, in particular a scene where she visits a young fan with cancer, but like the rest of the cast, she is handicapped by dialogue that is so banal, even an Oscar-winning thespian can’t bring it to life.

Country Strong’s title track might have put Paltrow on Billboard’s country singles Top 40, but otherwise the movie is utterly forgettable.

Country Strong * 1/2

Written & directed by Shana Feste

Rated PG-13

To read more about movies and other topics covered by movie critic Lori Hoffman visit the ‘Atlantic City Central’ blog at http://blog.acweekly.com/