Robert Altman crafts a pointed, kaleidoscopic pastiche with this sprawling overview of the country music industry. NASHVILLE may be the finest example of the directors style, famous and revered for using ensemble casts, and weaving intricately connected story-lines featuring multiple characters, and using lots of naturalistic cross-talk in the dialogs.
The central plot, the thread that brings it all together, is an upcoming concert for a populist Presidential hopeful.
It's really impossible to nutshell the magnitude and greatness of NASHVILLE, a film that won multiple awards, and, in proof of said greatness, was chosen for preservation by the hallowed National Film Registry.
And the cast. Oh it is to marvel at the cornucopia of amazing character actors! Ned Beatty, Ronee Blakley, Keith Carradine, Geraldine Chaplin, Robert DoQui, Shelley Duvall, Allen Garfield, Henry Gibson, Scott Glenn, Jeff Goldblum, Barbara Harris, David Hayward, Michael Murphy, Allan F. Nicholls, Cristina Raines, Bert Remsen, Lily Tomlin, Gwen Welles, Keenan Wynn, and the always amazing Karen Black (who did all her own singing/songwriting).
They seriously do not make them like this anymore. The closest pieces of work in recent memory would be from Paul Thomas Anderson's BOOGIE NIGHTS, and his follow up, MAGNOLIA. Other than that, you'll need to go pick up the works of Altman to get a fix of the class and level of American cinema.
~Sean Smithson
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