HEARTWORN HIGHWAYS
Directed by Jim
Szalapski
MVD Visual, 92
minutes, Re-release of 1981 original.
In the United States, anything that isn’t classical, opera,
or jazz gets lumped into the category of “popular music.” For now I’ll ignore the
fact that such distinctions are looser than old elastic. Many film buffs would
say that the greatest "popular" music documentaries of all time are
Martin Scorsese's The Last Waltz
(1976) and Jonathan Demme’s Stop Making
Sense (1984). If either film has a flaw, it is that each is simply a
concert film—glorious ones shot in path-breaking ways, but there wasn’t a whole
lot of script work to be done. Let’s add another to the list of top popular
music films, Jim Szalapski’s Heartworn
Highways. It was shot in late 1975 and early 1976, but wasn’t released until
1981. That’s rather fitting, as many of its country music subjects didn’t
attract a lot of notice until around then.
Heartworn Highways
is also script-challenged, but its visuals reveal volumes. Scorsese and Demme
sought to iconize The Band and The Talking Heads, but they were already famous.
That was not the case of those in Szalapski’s film: Guy Clark, Townes Van
Zandt, Rodney Crowell, Larry Jon Wilson, Steve Young, Gamble Rogers, David
Allan Coe, and an unrecognizably young Steve Earle. Back then, even the Charlie
Daniels Band filled high school auditoriums, but not big arenas. They folks were
“outlaws” in that their brand of country music evoked old-time country music,
especially its balladic traditions. To put matters in perspective, they were
the contemporaries of chart toppers such as Glen Campbell, John Denver, Merle
Haggard, Ronnie Milsap, Dolly Parton, Kenny Rogers, and Tanya Tucker. Not to
take anything away from them, but theirs was a country music defined by big
labels, mass markets, and image-makers. It was not necessarily what made the
heart sing down at Big Mack McGowan’s Wigwam Tavern, the kind of place where
really good (and really awful) players came together to sing old-style country.
It’s also where you’d find Glenn Stegner, who once played with Uncle Dave
Macon.
The folks in Heartworn
Highways are those hanging out in the dirt-poor back roads of Texas and
Tennessee. There’s no context or explanation in this loosely structured film,
but we infer they’re all connected to Guy Clark. We visit Van Zandt at his
Austin trailer, where dogs, chickens, rabbits, and squalor surround him. We
drop in on Wilson in the recording studio the morning after he had partied the
night away, watch Clark rebuild his guitar, witness one of Rogers’ stand-up
good ‘ole boy comedy routines, and join Coe as he pilots his bus towards a gig
at the Tennessee State Prison—a place where his daddy spent most of his life
and Coe also did time. Check out Coe’s concert duds; by contrast they make
Vegas Elvis, Gene Simmons of KISS and Alice Cooper look like GQ covers. There’s hardly a scene in
which we don’t see the men with a cigarette in one hand and a bottle of whiskey
in the other. The women are mostly in the kitchen or putting up with small
barbs from their men, a reminder of how different the world was before second
wave feminism trickled down. You might even be tempted to dismiss all of these
guys as deplorable—until they sing. There’s an amazing encounter between Townes
Van Zandt and his black neighbor, 79-yeard-old Seymour Washington. Van Zandt
rambles incoherently and Washington holds forth on the virtues of moderation.
(Wrong audience!) Then Townes picks up the guitar, sings “Waitin’ Around to
Die,” as Washington washes the tears from his face. It’s a helluva song and a
tender moment that reminds us that these country outlaws drew from streams
watered by hard times, the blues, heartbreak, folk music, and pain. It’s
impossible not to be moved by songs like “Ohoopee River Bottomland” (Wilson),
“Bluebird Wine” (Crowell), or “Alabama Highway” (Young). Above them stood
Clark, who sings with ease and writes with grace. He zings off a masterpiece
like “L.A. Freeway” and just put down the guitar. Everyone of these folks
could/can pick a guitar like a demon—their connections to African American
country blues evident in each finger movement.
Szalapski’s camera work is on par with the music. You might
often wonder who is on screen as there are no title boxes to inform you, but it
doesn’t matter. Szalapski uses montage, collage, rapid sequences, and artful
shots—like those of trucks shedding sheets of water during a downpour—with slow
pan shots that bathe us in life among the other half and it’s a more effective
lesson than any sociologist could teach. Contrast all of this with the
airbrushed glitz of Dollywood and you’ll know what made them outlaws. Listen to
today’s country music with its blistering guitar work and the willingness (of
some) to tackle social issues, or the very renown now held by Charlie Daniels
and Steve Earle, and you’ve got you answer about why these rebels mattered. Guy
Clark, in my opinion, remains one of the most underappreciated geniuses of our
time.
This is not your average documentary. It lets image and song
tell the story and expects viewers to fill in the gaps. It is truly remarkable
film and we should be thankful that DVD Visuals has made it available again.
Rob Weir
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