Jeff Bridges plays a great drunk in Crazy Heart

Surely one of the safest bets for an Oscar this year is Jeff Bridges for his performance in Crazy Heart. His portrayal of an alcoholic country musician, Bad Blake, has already won him a Golden Globe and a Critic's Choice Award. But is the film, which opens this week in the UK, any more than the sum of its notable parts?
 
Bad Blake is a wandering musician at the end of a career that in no way reflects its successful beginnings. His straggly beard and lank ponytail compliment an obtrusive belly, and a glass of whisky is ever-present.
 
Inevitable comparisons have been made between Bad Blake and the Dude, Bridge's earlier role in The Big Lebowski, but as David Denby says in the New Yorker, "Bad, unlike the sublime Dude in Lebowski, is not pleased with himself. He's played out and past caring". They may both make regular stops at bowling alleys but, for Bad, these serve only as bitter reminders of how far he has fallen.
 
More accurate parallels can be made with Randy 'The Ram' Robinson in The Wrestler, which won Mickey Rourke the best actor Oscar last year. They share a bleak existence living in the shadows of former glories – and both plots explore their encounters with women who possess redemptive qualities.
 
In place of The Wrestler's Marisa Tomei is Maggie Gyllenhaal who plays Jean, a New Mexico journalist and single mother, who along with her son enters the life of the wandering singer and gives it meaning. Gyllenhaal has, like Tomei, been nominated for the best supporting actress Oscar and is another good reason to see the film.
 
Bridges and Gyllenhaal aside, however, reviewers have been quick to criticise the film's striking limitations. As Kirk Honeycutt puts it for the Hollywood Reporter, director Scott Cooper is  "working with tired material… an ex-star out of control and the self-destructive drunk is a cross between types with too many antecedents in other movies". Adds Denby in the New Yorker: "The movie needs more plot, more complication, more conflict".

WHAT THE CRITICS ARE SAYING:Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: "The notion of a broke-down, boozy country singer is an archetype in pop culture. We've seen this story before. The difference is, Bad Blake makes us believe it happened to him."Mary F Pols, Time: "While the film isn't quite the timeless gem The Big Lebowski is, Bridges playing the perennially soused is, once again, spectacularly award-worthy."AO Scott, New York Times: "There can never be too many songs about drinking, loving and feeling bad, and there is always room for another version of that old song about the guy who messed it all up and kept on going. Especially when that guy can play the tune as truly and as well as Mr Bridges."David Denby, New Yorker: "This is not a movie about miracles. Nor is Crazy Heart quite a miracle itself. It has a gentle, unforced rhythm, and what’s there is good and true. But there’s not enough of it." ·