Crazy

Sweet and Lowdown is a great guitar player movie where the star can't really play. There was one about Hendrix that was a really terrible one. I can't remember the name, but I bet anything it was called "Scuse me while I kiss the sky" or something equally trite. I just finished watching "Crazy" on Amazon. It's about Hank Garland. Lots of shots of really cool old guitars played by fingers that don't look like they could tie shoes.My review? The story was kind of cool. Like "Walk the Line" but it has the f-bomb in it way more than you think people in purple cowboy shirts realistically should be dropping it. Also, they accuse each other of sucking dudes' wieners more than the guys did in "Saturday Night Fever", and that seems disproportionate for the Bible Belt.I am no expert, so I can't tell if it's bad acting or bad editing when the guy playing Hank pauses a really long time before he talks, like he is trying to remember what he is supposed to say. There is a scene where he is watching this jazz combo with Dave Brubeck and Joe Morello and some guitar player I should probably know if jazz weren't such horrible music, and I thought he was staring down the guitarist like he can do it better. But then the band takes a break and he goes up and tells them they are great and accuses them of sucking each others' weiners or something.Another completely unnecessary scene has Hank Garland (wearing a purple cowboy shirt) in a club walking up to a table with 3 dudes and one hot chick. One of the dudes says "You got something to say, shitkicker?" and after a confusingly long pause, Garland says "No." and then walks away. That's not me not being able to describe the scene adequately. That is really all that happened. After that scene, I felt much like you probably feel after reading this paragraphs.There is one guy who looks like he can actually play upright bass. I guess he's a black guy because they use him as a prop to show how ahead of his time and open minded Garland was. But he kind of looks like a hispanic or jewish guy in malcolm x glasses. The actress playing Evelyn Garland is pretty terrible, too. So this is the scene where the movie clumsily defines her as the bad guy. Spoiler alert. She puts Hank in the nut house and then I guess she quit the movie or something. The next time they mention her, they just say she died in a car wreck in Wisconsin, like Mike Brady's first wife or Charlie Sheen. They show a montage of happy times with Hank from earlier in the movie (almost showing boobs) and play "Tennessee waltz" in the background for some reason.Overall, it was way better than anything else I get to watch for free on Amazon that I haven't already seen fifty million times like all 5 seasons of Workaholics. I like looking at cool old Gibsons and girls in pointy bras. If you do, too then you'd be "Crazy" not to watch this compelling drama about a cool old Nashville guitar player that you may never have heard of... of whom you have may never... of... screw it.

A much fictionalized story. No academy award winner here but if you like the music of Hank Garland and the emerging rock n roll and Nashville of the '50s- it's enjoyable.

Long ago and far away I fell in love with the guitar. It was my first, and perhaps healthiest, obsession. I was in my mid teens when I started playing professionally in rock bands of the sixties. I was good at it, and I still am today, but never top shelf. Along the way I listened to a lot of superior guitarist, i.e. Chet Atkins, Wes Montgomery, Johnny Smith, et al. They were my heroes. Then one day I bought an album called "Jazz Winds from a New Direction" (http://www.amazon.com/Jazz-Winds-From-New-Direction/dp/B000005D9A) which featured a new guitarist, Hank Garland, and was also the premier appearance of vibist Gary Burton. Though his principle claim to fame up until then was as a first call guitarist in Nashville, I had never heard him. After all, I am a jazz bigot, with funk leanings. I was totally blown away by this album, and actually wore out my first copy (those were LP days). Within a few years I heard that he had been in an automobile accident and had lost the ability to play. A sad day indeed.Fast forward to today, when I discovered this gem of a biography, "Crazy", about the life and times of Hank Garland. It's well done, and very authentic as far as the music it presents. I never realized that this hero of mine had suffered from his obsession somewhat the same way I did early in my life. Music has been at the center of my life for most of my seventy one years now. The drama of Hank Garland's life is a must see for anyone who shares my obsession.

How could you not love a film that casts one if its executive producer, guitarist Steve Vai, as the legendary Hank Williams? This film, inspired by the life of the great Nashville session guitarist Hank Garland, is a terrific music business biography. I knew Garland by name and was familiar with much of his country and early rock and roll work, but I wasn't aware that he also worked in the world of jazz. While a bit formulaic in portraying American racism in the 1950s and early 1960s, it is to be commended that the movie addresses the challenges faced by Garland and the black musicians he worked with as they sought to find partners that inspired them to new creative heights even though it would have been easier and safer to stay within the prescribed "color lines" of the times . Crazy also shows the less than fair accounting and label management practices that were relatively common during the 1950s as it tells the tale of Garland's rise and sad fall. The film doesn't portray him as a good man; it portrays him as a talented, flawed human being who was only at piece when he was making music. Waylon Payne gives a strong performance as Hank Garland as does Ali Larter as Hank's wife, Evelyn. Terrific period touches, ranging from clothing to furniture and decor to recording studios and touring vehicles, all elevate the look and feel of this modestly budgeted film which has been well shot and lit under the guidance of cinematographer Craig Haagensen. The film is solidly directed by Rick Bieber. This film definitely deserves to reach a wider audience.

I had never heard of Hank Garland until I heard session guitarist Larry Koonse playing "Angel Eyes" and saw that it was off a soundtrack to this film. That was enough to send me hunting for it and I'm not sorry to have spent a Sunday afternoon watching this. Reading Garland's bio, I suspect that approximately 75% of the story is fiction, but if you watch it in that vein, it's rather fascinating. The leads put their all into the portrayals, I dug the music, and they largely got the 50s and early 60s right.