Walk the Line (2005)
Directed by James Mangold
A chronicle of country music legend Johnny Cash's life, from his early days on an Arkansas cotton farm to his rise to fame with Sun Records in Memphis, where he recorded alongside Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins.
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What critics compared Walk the Line to
The modern musical biopic is less biography and more hagiography, usually with a great soundtrack. Bohemian Rhapsody, Elvis, and Walk the Line have no interest in telling the real story of the people who made the songs we love.
I used to believe that Walk Hard, Jake Kasdan and Judd Apatow’s pitch-perfect parody of movies like Ray and Walk the Line, should have killed the conventional musical biopic.
Unlike “Walk the Line,” which only has to deal with Johnny Cash’s story, “Straight Outta Compton” manages to give equal weight to Dr. Dre (Corey Hawkins), Ice Cube (O’Shea Jackson Jr.) and Easy-E (Jason Mitchell), at the same time giving supporting note to MC Ren (Aldis Hodge) as well as offering a barrage of character cameos from Snoop Dogg to Tupac.
To find a comparable evocation of American aspiration and excess, skip such musical biopic predecessors as “Walk the Line” and “Ray” and look at Martin Scorsese’s “The Wolf of Wall Street.”
The key to the best music biopics – Ray, Walk the Line, Sid & Nancy – is their willingness and allowance to portray their protagonists, as, well, assholes.
In fact, director James Mangold (“3:10 To Yuma,” “Walk the Line”) makes it clear that those questions aren’t important.
Mangold, who directed 3:10 to Yuma (2007) and Walk the Line (2005), knows that Knight and Day has none of their realism.
Logistics don't worry Mangold (Walk the Line, Kate & Leopold) â fade-to-black is his winking way of addressing the plot holes â and clearly he expects his wink to be met by our smile.
The director is James Mangold , whose previous two films were " Walk the Line " and " 3:10 to Yuma ."
Tom Cruise is top-billed, but this spy spoof's point of view belongs to Cameron Diaz: The latest from director James Mangold (whose "Walk the Line" was as much about June Carter as Johnny Cash) is not really a male-oriented action thriller but a romantic fantasy for a plugged-in generation of green screen-savvy girls sympathetic to the idea of courtship as a hyperadrenalized series of deliriums and fugue states, with Cruise -- the "Cocktail" star now a self-caricature of cockiness -- the dubious modern knight who rides to the rescue on a motorcycle steed.
James Mangold ( Walk the Line ) directs this cinematic blend of action drama, romantic comedy, and globe-hopping espionage tale.
Versatile director James Mangold has directed two biographic dramas, namely Girl, Interrupted (1999) and Walk The Line (2005), which chronicles the lives of author Susanna Kaysen and singer-songwriter Johnny Cash, respectively.
His writing and directing on films like Logan, Walk the Line, and 3:10 to Yuma shows his knack for reinventing and improving familiar stories, and Ford v Ferrari doesn’t break from that tradition.
The hope shared by 20th Century Fox; its corporate overlord, Disney; director James Mangold (“Walk the Line,” “Logan”); and others connected to this unfashionable $100 million picture rests on the movie finding a larger audience than a full range of recent racing-themed commercial disappointments, from “Speed Racer” to “Rush.”
On the other hand, when he either adapts a well-known novel, such as Girl, Interrupted , or approaches a biopic such as Walk the Line , the results are decidedly more mixed.
Written by Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth and Jason Keller, “Ford v Ferrari” is well-directed by James Mangold, whose diverse resume includes the terrific June Carter and Johnny Cash biopic “Walk the Line” (2005) and the Western “3:10 to Yuma” (2007).
James Mangold ( Walk the Line , Logan ) spends a lot of time depicting their family life.
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Both featured songs performed or written by Johnny Cash* (“Hurt” in Logan, a Halsey cover of “Walk the Line” in Rangers) and portentous fade-in, fade-out cuts of superhero hijinks.
Given the guy’s stacked, eclectic resume — 1997’s Cop Land, 1999’s Girl, Interrupted, 2005’s Walk the Line, 2007’s 3:10 to Yuma, et al — there was never any doubting his abilities, but few could have ever predicted he’d return with something this vital and bruising, not after his good-but-not-great take on The Wolverine.
(See his cop Western Copland, or the musical Western Walk the Line, or the samurai Western The Wolverine.)
I've been a big fan of Mangold's films, especially Cop Land (a personal favorite of mine), Girl Interrupted, Walk the Line, 3:10 to Yuma (another personal favorite), and The Wolverine.
Cowriter (with "Green Lantern's" Michael Green and "The Wolverine's" Scott Frank)/director James Mangold ("Walk the Line," "The Wolverine") has wrapped the trilogy with R-rated violence and gore while also giving his protagonist that which has always eluded him.
Mangold (Walk the Line) tries to provide Jackman's Logan with Johnny Cash-worthy demonstrations of integrity, even ratifying that honorability with Cash's classic Pentecostal song "The Man Comes Around."
An explicit nod to the 1953 Western Shane , where Alan Ladd’s stoic loner battles to save homesteaders from a murderous cattle baron, tells you plenty about where Jackman and Mangold were at , as does the choice of rugged Johnny Cash songs for the soundtrack (Mangold directed the Cash biopic Walk the Line as well as the remake of 3.10 to Yuma ).
Despite the presence of an age-appropriate cute cowpoke named Travis (Lucas Till -- Johnny Cash's de-armed brother in "Walk the Line"), Miley initially resents life on the farm with lovable Grandma Ruby (Margo Martindale).
In Crowley Corners we find endless picturesque vistas, a hunky farm boy (Lucas Till, Walk the Line), an evil land developer (Barry Bostwick, reminding us how long ago Rocky Horror was), an endlessly wise grandmother (Margo Martindale, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story) and Miley introducing “a little hip-hop” at a hoedown.
Casting decisions, for the most part, helped the cause; while cameos like Tyra Banks, Taylor Swift, and Rascal Flatts give the film star power, the acting chops of character actor Margo Martindale (in the matriarchal role of Miley's Grandma Ruby) and the magnetic charisma of young star Lucas Till (previously seen most memorably as Jack Cash in Walk the Line) add some much needed nuance and depth.
As love interest Travis, Lucas Till (2005's " Walk the Line ") was clearly cast for his looks over his thespian prowess, while Vanessa Williams (2004's "Johnson Family Vacation") brings a layer of dignity to her thankless role as Miley's dedicated publicist Vita.
James Marsh's movie is for physicist Stephen Hawking what Walk the Line was to Johnny Cash, emotional complexity distilled for easier commercial digestion.
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Inside Llewyn Davis is something like a sketch of a burgeoning cultural scene crossed with a biopic about a man who never lived—think Nashville by way of Walk the Line, were Johnny Cash a figment of your imagination.
That allows new-to-the-fold director James Mangold ("3:10 to Yuma," "Walk the Line") to play up and off the cultural aspects of the Japanese warrior, especially, as one character puts it, Wolverine being akin to a ronin or a samurai without a master.
Mangold (3:10 to Yuma, Walk the Line), a director better known for muscular dramatics than muscular mutants, is clearly aiming for a more down-to-earth superhero movie with The Wolverine, especially compared with the knuckleheaded X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009).
Despite the presence of director James Mangold ("Walk The Line", the 2005 film that garnered five Oscar noms and a win for Reese Witherspoon), "The Wolverine" suffers from repetitive fight scenes that could have been condensed.
Director James Mangold ("3:10 to Yuma," "Walk the Line"), brought in after original director Darren Aronofsky backed out, captures some playful images and balances yet another grim superhero saga with effective comic relief.
“The Wolverine,” competently directed by James Mangold (“Walk the Line”), is a serviceable superhero movie, one that might be thrilling if special-effects pictures came along four times a year instead of four times a month.