Grant some men dictatorial powers for a day, they might be inclined to disarm the public and institute martial law. Maybe conduct a terror campaign against all enemies, real and imagined, just to see ‘em squirm. Others might build the world’s biggest whorehouse with yours truly as the only customer. Me, I’d ban the bio-pic. Forever and always.
Even the mere hint of a “true story” would land anyone, from screenwriter to studio chief, in some sort of gulag of my design. Because I’d also do that. Seems a shame not to. But above all, putting the life and times of an actual human being on the big screen would become the greatest crime imaginable. Because it is. Especially when it inspires the likes of Sweet Dreams, shameless Oscar bait that manages to reduce a lovely voice to a mere afterthought. The songs are wonderful, naturally, as it’s Patsy Cline we’re talking about, but they’re not enough. Not even remotely. At best they fill up twenty minutes. The rest is chaos.
In the final analysis, Sweet Dreams isn’t even interested in probing a life; getting into the marrow of a woman who seemed to come out of nowhere and take country music by storm. Then again, maybe she was this empty. It’s possible. But then, if she were, why make a movie? We have the music forever preserved, so why insist on telling a tale that’s so cliché-ridden and color-by-numbers that it could literally be about any random person who may or may not have had a few hit records? Hell, fictionalize the whole damn thing and at least we wouldn’t be asking questions. Hollywood has been pumping out similar claptrap for decades and most went from release to obscurity in a single afternoon. Because the rise of a star is inherently uninteresting at this stage, even with talent like Jessica Lange and Ed Harris (as Charlie Dick) aboard. If this is what you pulled from the archives of the Cline estate, perhaps someone, somewhere ought to have pumped the brakes. Being famous isn’t enough.
So, what are we left with? When we first see her, she’s singing in no-account joints for spare change. She’s unhappily married, mainly because her first husband is a decent guy who insists on not knocking out her teeth. She’s an artist, dammit, and artists fuck around with deadbeats and felons and live life on the edge. So, when Ed Harris comes waltzing in, all rebel and renegade, it’s all she can do to keep her dress zipped up. Naturally, she’s disgusted at first, but as every movie ever made makes clear – as well as real life – the guy who is absolutely the worst for a woman is the one she wants. Then, in a montage of perhaps four scenes and ninety seconds, the pair flirt, kiss, dance, fuck, and get married. But first, she must divorce the dull guy. That, apparently, takes another minute or so of everyone’s time. And that’s the film’s logic. Scenes of divorce follow scenes of sweet lovemaking; all mashed together in one of the worst editing jobs in the history of the cinema. It doesn’t get much better.
If one were to believe Sweet Dreams, Patsy’s life, from sunup to sundown, consisted of but three things: singing, talking about singing, and getting yelled at by her husband. Add to that the character of Patsy’s mama (played by Lana from Three’s Company), a Southern matriarch who exists solely to act concerned and threaten to backhand her daughter. On occasion she offers a bon mot. Their relationship, like the rest of the movie, is little more than expectations fulfilled, with nary a surprise to follow. They act not as loved ones do, or would, but as the shabbily constructed screenplay forces them to behave. If there are inner lives, they were very much left on the cutting room floor. The music scenes, whether on stage or inside a recording studio, are blissful escapes from the pedestrian main story, but even they are lip-synched; badly, I might add. But at least that ensures we’re getting the real deal. Whatever you want to say about Patsy after this shitshow, her talent was inescapable.
And so we beat on, Patsy and Charlie getting in spats, Patsy getting pregnant, Charlie getting drafted, and yes, Charlie patting the ass of one cheap tart too many. He drinks, she bitches, and not once do they exchange any dialogue that rings true. That said, these are Virginia hill people, not members of the Algonquin Round Table, so maybe it’s more accurate than we know. These are limited folks with limited interests, so showing them “doing things” might very well be reduced to lounging around and making dinner. Still, even bumpkins have a perspective, and it might be important to consult it at some point in a two-hour enterprise. Otherwise, just make it a concert film and reduce Charlie’s presence to an occasional grin from the cheap seats. To be fair, the film does add a jailhouse scene (Charlie beats Patsy to a pulp, of course) that tries to get at the heart of his relationship with his father, but by that point, it’s way past our bedtime. Third act revelations are the tactics of the lazy, not genuine insights to be treasured.
All this to arrive at the ending we all know about: Patsy’s premature death in a plane crash at the age of 30. We know it’s coming, and that inevitability might have lent the proceedings an air of sadness, only we didn’t much care for her or anyone else while they were alive, so their deaths are merciful to us all. At least this means this shit is about to wrap up. But, in a revisionist turn that won’t make a lick of sense to anyone with a functioning brain, they change the facts. Not for the sake of time, or decency, or simply what might have been filmable. No, it’s for the worst reason of all: a manufactured crisis. Pulling at the heartstrings one last time. Forced drama, when the previous 112 minutes nearly put us to sleep.
In truth, Patsy’s plane crashed minutes after a refueling stop during high winds and low visibility. Due to pilot error, the plane got too low, took a quick dive, and plunged into a forest. In the movie, Patsy’s plane is cruising along, when it suddenly encounters engine trouble. All aboard are concerned, and a few mention nearly pissing their pants. Suddenly, the pilot gets everything working again, and God be praised, they’ll make it after all. But the clouds soon part, and one of the passengers points ahead. A mountain! A move is made, but it’s too late. The plane hits the mountainside, explodes in a wall of flame, and in a flash, they cut to the funeral. Only there was no mountain. No fucking mountain at all. It’s like telling the story of JFK, concluding this time with his fatal stabbing on the Stemmons Freeway. Suddenly, my indifference turned to rage, and the merely bad became inexcusably awful. Making shit up is how we do business (especially Hollywood) but at least let it make sense. Was a lawsuit threatened? The director owe a favor to the pyrotechnics crew? A crash right after takeoff not meaningful enough for a big star?
Because Sweet Dreams has deservedly faded from view, I highly doubt there will be an investigation. And hell, the screenwriter himself died in 2017. But I am determined to find out. Obsessing over minutiae is what I do. I’d even forgive the whole fucking thing if they just told me why they tacked on a finale from another movie. Someone died in this manner, but it wasn’t Patsy Cline. Still, it garnered Lange a Best Actress nomination. Because it had to. Coal Miner’s Daughter made us think of Patsy again, and Sissy Spacek took home the top prize for her troubles. Only this is no Coal Miner’s Daughter. Christ, it’s not even Satisfaction. Just another soulless money grab, picking at the long dead corpse of someone who deserves to rest in peace, but can’t. But at least Sweet Dreams won’t change anyone’s mind about Cline, for good or bad. It couldn’t. There’s simply not enough to go on.
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