Tender Mercies Movie Review

Tender Mercies (1983)

Rent Tender Mercies on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: Horton Foote
Directed by: Bruce Beresford
Starring: Robert Duvall, Tess Harper, Betty Buckley, Wilford Brimley, Ellen Barkin
Rated: PG
Watch the trailer

Plot
Mac Sledge, a broken-down, middle-aged country singer gets a new wife, reaches out to his long-lost daughter, and tries to put his troubled life back together.

Verdict
A character study following a country singer that lost it all. Duvall does a great job, winning both the Golden Globe and the Oscar. It unfolds slowly as Mac reconciles his past and present. I wish this explored Mac's feelings about his past and present, but it's easy enough to guess.
It depends.

Review
Mac Sledge has passed his prime and is down on his luck, living a small town and working at a motel. He used to be a star and now he's working odd jobs. He handles it well, though I wonder if he should feel the longing for his past stronger than he does. It's clear he was an alcoholic, but the movie doesn't delve into that.

Robert Duvall plays Mac Sledge.

This is about who he is now and who he was. People that recognize him in this small town only know who he was and what they saw. No one knew who he really was, the turmoil and struggles in his life. He's free of that now, starting a new life.

He still writes music, presumably as it's all he knows. With his life stable, he reaches out to his daughter. It's a great scene where Mac meets his daughter. Duvall conveys so many emotions. You can tell he loves and misses his daughter, but with how much time has passed he doesn't know how to interact with her.

Mac falls into this life of working at the hotel and marrying the proprietor. It seemed like a marriage of convenience more than love. Mac found somebody willing to put up with him that was stable and that's it. The movie doesn't dissect it. I wonder how Mac feels. He lived the dream, and now it's nothing but a memory. That dream looked great to the public, but it left Mac in a bad place. He's resolved to fix his mistakes, and I can only assume that the beginning of the movie was his rock bottom.