We’ve all heard that joke about what happens when you play a country song in reverse: You sober up, your wife comes back, and your dog rises from the grave. While that joke plays off of some broad stereotypes of the country music scene, those stereotypes exist for a reason. I was in high school during the boom of 90s country stars like Garth Brooks, Clint Black, and Alan Jackson. I also grew up in Montana, so the country music scene was even more strong, and I had the dubious honor of having to, year after year, participate in two weeks of country line dancing classes in school. I hated it, and for the longest time, that translated to a hatred for the music by association. It made me not want to watch westerns or have anything to do with the cowboy genre.
Fortunately, I grew up and eventually put aside these stupid prejudices, although I still refuse to listen to 90s country music just out of principle. I became a fan of John Wayne, The Lone Ranger, Gunsmoke, and am planning on watching my way through Have Gun Will Travel in the near future. A film like Tender Mercies would have been agony to the me in the 90s, and I never would have given it a chance at the time. Apparently, audiences in the 80s didn’t give it much of a chance, either, as it was a box office failure upon its theatrical release. That didn’t stop it from scoring high marks from critics and securing several Oscar nominations at the 1984 awards show. But, of course, a small-scale drama about heartache, guilt, and family didn’t stand a chance of winning it all. Yet the film that did win, Terms of Endearment, was about a lot of those same things, too.
Lead actor Robert Duvall blames the financial failure of the film on a lack of understanding about country music. Perhaps he is right. I was too young to remember what the country music scene was like in the early 80s, but I do remember that it exploded in the 90s. Perhaps if this film had been made a decade later, it would have been more successful. As it is, this is a film that has gone mostly forgotten over the last forty years, which is a shame because it is a film that deserves to be rediscovered. The story may be a little thin, but the message is a strong one that nearly anyone can relate to.
Success doesn’t equal happiness. That is one thing Mac Sledge (Robert Duvall) has learned from years on the road as a successful country music singer/songwriter. He turned to alcohol and became a mean drunk, losing his wife, his daughter, and nearly his life thanks to his addiction to the bottle. The film opens up years down the road as he awakens at a rundown Texas roadside motel and gas station, broke and hitting rock bottom. There, he meets the owner of the motel, Rosa Lee (Tess Harper), who offers him a job in exchange for room and board on the condition that he doesn’t drink on the job. He accepts that condition and, as time marches on, he manages to stay dry even when not working. He also begins to develop feelings for Rosa Lee and her young son, Sonny (Allan Hubbard). Eventually, after staying sober long enough, he and Rosa Lee wed.
Through her influence, he begins attending church with her regularly, where she sings in the choir. Finally, he accepts the invitation to be baptized, too. But his past life keeps trying to intrude on his newfound happiness. A reporter shows up, having tracked him down, and tries to convince him to give an interview, discussing his life with his ex-wife. Also, some local musicians offer him an opportunity to sing with them. On top of all that, his ex-wife, Dixie (Betty Buckley), is performing nearby, singing many of his old songs. She wants nothing to do with him and refuses to allow him to see their daughter, Sue Anne (Ellen Barkin), who is now eighteen. Word gets to her anyway that he is nearby, and Sue Anne comes to see him one day, reopening old wounds. She has been spoiled by her mother all her life and now is determined to marry an alcoholic of her own and run off against her mother’s wishes. Sue Anne doesn’t hate her father, but she doesn’t really remember him, either. Mac is afraid of the happiness he has found with Rosa Lee because he doesn’t quite trust that it will last, feeling that he is undeserving of it.
It is no surprise that Robert Duvall took home the Oscar for this movie. The role is a bit understated, but Duvall is able to inject some nuance into it that shows off how to take a role like this and elevate it. It’s not a flashy performance by a long shot, but there are no false notes here. When he first confronts his ex-wife and she refuses him access to his daughter, he stays relatively calm on the outside, but there are so many mixed emotions behind those eyes. We never see him acting violently towards anyone, but we can see that that potential is always there just beneath the surface; all it would take is a little liquor to let it out for a while. We get that sense from the others around him, too, especially Harry, Dixie’s manager (Wilford Brimley), who used to represent Mac, too. Harry is still on good terms with Mac but is also wary around him, knowing the history that exists between the former couple.
Tess Harper is equally as good as Duvall in this. She is raising her son alone after losing her husband to the Vietnam War. Worse for her is not knowing the circumstances behind her husband’s death. Because of this, she has not told her son much about it, and he is at the age where he is starting to wonder. Rosa Lee is even more understated than Mac, something that may have contributed to Tess Harper getting overlooked at award season. She did get the nomination at the Golden Globes, but nothing else. During the last couple of minutes of the film, we really get a look at the deep sadness she has tried to keep from her son, both as he is quizzing her on his father and afterwards as she watches from a distance while he and Mac are enjoying playing a game of catch. This is a pain she cannot express and perhaps may never be able to.
Sadness is a theme that permeates much of this picture. We have Mac and Rosa Lee’s stories, but we also have Sue Anne and her reaching out to the father she has never known. She marries an alcoholic, just as her mother did, and it leads to tragedy. This hits Mac especially hard. “I don’t know why I wandered out of this part of Texas drunk, and you took me in and pitied me and helped me to straighten out, marry me. Why?” He asked Rosa Lee. “Why did that happen? Is there a reason that happened? And Sonny’s daddy died in the war... Why? See, I don’t trust happiness. I never did, I never will.” Here is a man hurting more than any man or woman ever should, and we would forgive him if he turned back to alcohol to cope with it. We would not like it, but we would understand it.
But Mac has something in his life again that is more powerful than all that sadness, and when we see him last, he is enjoying something as simple as a game of catch with a young boy. There is a look of pure joy on both of their faces as they spend this little bit of time together, not thinking about the harsh hand the world has given each of them but enjoying the moment together. They need each other just as much as Mac needs Rosa Lee. There is something a bit cathartic to this simple game of catch.
A film doesn’t need to have a complex story or complicated themes to be good. Sometimes just having a simple concept executed well is enough to make for a compelling drama. Tender Mercies is just such a film. It’s low-key and unassuming, which probably worked against it back in the day. Because of that, it has skated below my radar for far too long. It nails the experience of rural life in the middle of nowhere, a place where someone trying to hide from the limelight and avoid people would find themselves right at home. But just like reality, you can’t hide from it forever. As Mac discovers, God provides a way for him to redeem himself and find a bit of happiness in this sea of sadness.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Picture: Philip S. Hobel
Best Director: Bruce Beresford
Best Actor: Robert Duvall (won)
Best Screenplay - Written Directly for the Screen (won)
Best Original Song: “Over You” Music and Lyrics by Austin Roberts and Bobby Hart
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Release Date: March 4, 1983
Running Time: 92 minutes
Rated PG
Starring: Robert Duvall, Tess Harper, Betty Buckley, Wilford Brimley, and Ellen Barkin
Directed By: Bruce Beresford
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