Released in 2015 and starring Tom Hiddleston I Saw the Light is a biopic based on the brief meteoric life of Country singer Hank Williams. Adapting the biography writer and director Marc Abraham has a clear love and passion for the subject matter.
With a recording career that spanned jus six years, Williams blazed a brilliant career that produced 36 hit records and influenced Country/Western for decades after his premature death at 29 from heart disease. The film focuses on his turbulent relations ship with
image copyright Sony Pictures Classics
Audrey Sheppard Williams his first wife and sometimes singing partner (played by Elizabeth Olsen reuniting these two MCU stars), the pressures of his sudden fame, his complicated relationship with his mother, and his battles with alcoholism.
Hiddleston, a native of England, convincingly adopts William’s Alabama accent and singing mannerisms. Unlike many biopics about singers there is no attempt have the star lip sync to the singer’s performances but rather Hiddleston and Abraham work to create the impression of William’s unique style while giving the actor full reign for a performance. Olsen, as Audrey, has a tougher performance to nail down. Audrey’s irritation and eventual divorce from Williams over his infidelity and substance abuse issues is fairly straight forward and even handed but and additional source of friction in their relationship is Audrey’s desire for a singing career of her own and the film portrays her talents as quite lacking and Olsen must perform well enough that you can believe she has the possibility of a career and yet poorly enough that it is also clear she can never achieve her dreams. Frankly this did not work so well for me. It is possible that no one in the writing or production were looking out to make sure her story was faithful to her voice and viewpoint. I do not know enough to have an informed opinion but as for the action I think Olsen held her own against Hiddleston and they had a real on screen chemistry.
Where the film fails and it dos utterly is the lack of a narrative. Biopics are particularly tough genre to produce. A person life rarely falls neatly into a narrative structure and this is doubly so when the story has to encompass their death. While there are plenty of interesting characters and scenes a sequence of events is not a story. When the credits rolled on the Blu-ray I could not tell you why this film mattered or what it was trying to say, and you must always have something to say. There needs to be a point as to why were spent two hours caring about these characters and how that reflects on life in general. The film point of view is firmly fixed with Williams but we never come close to understanding the man, his art, or what drove his creativity. Without deeper themes or a character study the film is hollow and I cannot recommend it beyond enjoying Hiddleston’s enthusiastic performance.
