Gentle and unassuming, with the warmth and friendliness of an old friend, Garrison Keillor's iconic radio show "A Prairie Home Companion" has occupied a small niche of the American airwaves for nearly 30 years[1]. Here now comes the film version of that public radio institution, done with a quiet inoffensive charm by master filmmaker Robert Altman, the result being a thoroughly enjoyable and faithful rendering of the show and a cinematic delight for, dare I say it, the entire family.
The film's story, such as it is, revolves around the recent sale of the radio station to some media conglomerate in Texas, which wants to turn the theatre into a parking lot, effectively putting the show out of business and making this the final show. Keillor, the show's leader and host, has little interest in making any sort of fuss over the impending end, despite the objections of several members of the cast. Meanwhile, private eye and head of security Guy Noir (Kevin Kline) is busy tracking down the dangerous woman in the white trench-coat (Virginia Madsen) and trying to convince the Axeman (Tommy Lee Jones) that to end the show would be a great disservice. All of this occurs during the show, broadcast live in front of an audience, but this being an Altman film, the plot has little to do with what the film is really about. Altman's main focus is instead the interplay between various members of his ensemble cast and the inter-workings of a radio show behind the scenes. The plot is merely a structure around which the characters can revolve.
Keillor's script is structured like a radio play, with Guy Noir as the occasional narrator, mostly because if you're going to do an old radio play, you might as well have a private eye narrator, and partly because Guy Noir is one of Keillor's recurring characters. And if you're going to have Guy Noir as the narrator, then you have to have a dangerous woman. Keillor's master-stroke, though, is to make the dangerous woman an angel of death, a fitting metaphor for a radio show on it's last run. She could be coming for the Axeman or any member of the cast or for the show itself or even for the aspect of Americana that the show invokes, but it isn't really important in the end, because she represents the passage of time that serves as the film's unstated antagonist. The bad guy isn't really the Axeman or his Texas corporation (although it certainly isn't the hero), but the rapidly progressing world that makes such things possible. But no one handles such change better than Keillor, whose motto is that every show is the last show. In a great backstage scene, he sits quietly as the dangerous woman informs him that she is an angel of death, nonchalantly eating an apple. I guess when you've been doing live radio for 30 years, not even death can startle you.
Article comments
1 - Triniman
While I enjoyed this film, I have not been able to write a long enough review to warrant a posting on BC. The film was charming, but I found myself waiting for something to happen to develop an interesting story. That didn't quite happen for me.
2 - Lucas McNelly
since when does something have to happen?