Grace of My Heart

Sean Baker

Watched the new Scorpion Releasing Blu-rayNice extras:- Audio Commentary by Director/Writer Allison Anders- The Idea Becomes a Movie: Making-of Doc- Deleted Scenes- Theatrical Trailer

Sally Jane Black

First, the elephant in the room: the lip-syncing is not great, but it's also not a major distraction if you've come to love many other badly dubbed films. It's weird, but whatever, the emotional content of the film is much more important.Watching Ileana Douglas make this film great while the much bigger names around her are forced to act in her shadow illustrates something that always bothers me: the relegation of character actors and independent actors to the sidelines. When we say a performer deserves better, it can mean a lot: a more successful career, better writing or directing, etc. In this case, Douglas deserved more accolades, and she still deserves a career that recognizes her as a leading actress. She's found decent roles here and there, but her biggest films are all films in which she has smaller parts (smaller than deserved, anyway). And then there's Chasing Amy, and fuck, no one deserved that.Taking the story of Carole King and fictionalizing it is a decent project. The soundtrack they created for this works well and captures, if not the essence and iconic signature of Brill Building pop, at least the general gist of it. The references aren't lost, though there are times it feels like it's a little too neatly put together (literally putting the words "one fine day" into a song? really?). The film subtly addresses the toxic masculine milieu of the music industry, using Denise's relationships as the tool to show it. Her lovers/husbands are macho pigs, unfaithful, lying, manipulative, presumptuous, invasive, neglectful, and worse, and in the case of her first husband, she makes him a star. Her last husband (in the film) is supportive in a sense, but still shows it in the most derisive and hurtful possible way. It's not until she no longer lives tied to them that she finds success on her own, Joel Milner's support notwithstanding. His role is to acknowledge her power, not to suck it dry (at the end, anyway). Unfortunately, the film sidelines its black characters and ends up using them as props for Denise's story. The white savior narrative is not the heart of the film, but almost an afterthought, making the racism of it that much more unpleasant. The film barely touches on the fact that Denise is writing music for black musicians and trying to tell their stories, using this as a prop for her relationship with her first husband (who I cannot think of as anything but Eric Stoltz, what the fuck was his name in the film, oh who cares, anyway, Eric).

Vanina3.5

Illeana Douglas is a goddess of my youth, I feel like I watched her in so many films, but it turns out it was mostly 'To Die For', which I watched weirdly often as a pre-teen. Ever since, I've always made note to watch films she's in, but I had a hard time getting hold of this one. 'Grace of My Heart' has several things going for it, one is Douglas, the other main draw is Allison Anders, who writes (and directs) women like no other, and then this film is a loose adaptation of Carole King's life story. I've always been fascinated by King's transition from Brill Building songwriter to best-selling singer in her own right, so this looked an absolute treat. Sadly, hideous wigs and bad lip syncing really hold the film back, even though there are great performances and tunes to be found. Perhaps films like 'Inside Llewyn Davis' have spoiled me, where the actors are actually doing their own singing. There's a huge discrepancy between Illeana Douglas' speaking voice and the vocal dubbing by Kristen Vigard (Broadway's original Annie, apparently), which really ruins some fantastic scenes, especially a hugely moving rendition of Elvis Costello/Burt Bacharach-penned 'God Give Me Strength', filled with hurt and sadness and loss. Not only does the bad lip-syncing (throughout the film) manifest itself in weird overpronunciating lip movements and tongue curling, there's a lot of physical mannerisms to convey how they're really feeling the lyrics they're singing and it's silly and distracting and detrimental to an otherwise good film. Allison Anders did do a fantastic job with this film, as Douglas' character is so three-dimensional and real, I am really in awe of Anders in her accomplishments. I kind of wish Anders had decided to cover less ground, though. I realise this is a useless statement to make, as the story has to be of an aspiring singer struggling in the business, becoming a songwriter, living through tough shit and then coming out the other side. But, as it is, these 20-something years are tracked by some really awful, awful wigs and overly dated "fashionable" clothes to help the audience keep track of where we are in the story. It makes the actors look like a joke and also has the unintended effect of making Douglas' character come off as a fashion victim in the bad sense, who adapts too easily and doesn't stay true to herself. Strip all of this back, though, and there's some great stuff here, especially in the performances. Illeana Douglas shines, as do John Turturro as a strange Phil Spector-type and Jennifer Leigh Warren as a Crystals-type lead singer. Bridget Fonda has a great near-cameo as a Lesley Gore bubblegum singer who struggles with having to hide her homosexuality, and Patsy Kensit brings some sincerity as a best friend to Douglas. Allison Anders writes great women, like no other, really, but I prefer it when she keeps it small like in 'Gas, Food, Lodging'. This is a great guilty pleasure, but with some tweaks it wouldn't have needed the "guilty" in there.