The glory of Blaze
Neglected country musician gets a fitting tribute
“I don’t know who Blaze Folly is,” says a radio DJ at the start of the interview that frames this heartfelt musical biopic. Well, first of all it’s Foley, not Folly. And second, not many people have heard of the U.S. country music singer-songwriter, a contemporary of Waylon Jennings and Dolly Parton who never achieved that level of fame and who died in 1989, just shy of 40.
“Stars burn out ’cause they shine for themselves,” says Ben Dickey as Blaze Foley, one musician playing another. “Look at me shine. Look at me glow. But a legend lasts forever.” He’d rather be a legend than a star.
Ethan Hawke was determined to shine a little glow on Foley, co-writing the screenplay with the man’s ex-wife, Sybil Rosen (played here by Alia Shawkat), and taking up directing reins for just the fourth time in his career. (Notably, his last film was a documentary about pianist Seymour Bernstein. His last feature was also about a singer-songwriter.)
Dickey literally ambles through the film as Foley, who had a limp because of childhood polio, and seems to have been often a touch inebriated. Hawke’s screenplay staggers a little as well, but artfully so, moving from posthumous reminiscences by close friend Townes Van Zandt (Charlie Sexton) to Foley’s last performance, a few days before his death, and through his years with Rosen, which were happy but ultimately doomed by his demons.
There’s a sense of musical discovery in the film, a little like what many viewers of the 2012 documentary Searching for Sugar Man must have felt: How was it I didn’t know of this guy’s music before? Hawke lets the songs play out, sometimes as straight-up performances, others as soundtrack to other things happening on the screen, or even moving between those roles.
We also get quite a few bawdy, shaggy-dog stories from Foley, who swears they’re completely true and reels you in until it’s hilariously clear they’re most definitely not. Foley’s easygoing style is also on display in the scene where he meets Rosen’s parents (the real Rosen has a cameo as her own mom), who want to know if he’ll convert. He asks if Zero Mostel was Jewish. Yes? That seals it: He’ll do it.
Beautifully shot, this low-key life story feels at times like you’re flipping through an old album, crammed with artfully arranged memories and aphorisms. Rosen, a struggling actress, at one point discusses her stage fright with Foley. He tells her she can cure it by being aware of her heart beating and her breath flowing: “Confidence is a consolation to knowing you’re alive.” He doesn’t sing it, but it’s the most musical line in the movie.