Honeydripper

By Matthew Rodgers

John Sayles is in familiar territory with his 16th feature film as director, treading the back water town of Harmony, Alabama in the 1950’s with his latest examination of American sub-culture, and primarily the birth Rock n’ Roll.

The titular Honeydripper lounge is in big trouble; riddled with debt and struggling to compete with the adjacent hot spot, proprietor Tyrone Purvis (Danny Glover – Dreamgirls) lays off regular blues singing attraction Bertha Mae and duplicitously announces the appearance of one of the country’s hottest guitar playing talents, Guitar Sam, the problem is he isn’t coming. So when an initially rebuffed young drifter arrives into town it’s up to him to perform on the biggest and possibly last night in the old clubs history.

Honeydripper’s major flat note lays in the absence of the toe-tapping music it’s meant to be painting the evolution of, saving it until the final reel. Instead it relies too much on an admittedly impressive set up that evokes the feel of 50’s Deep South – superb costumes, set design, and stunning locations, in particular the intricately recreated cotton fields, are all as much a character as the key players – with repetitive expository “once upon a time” and “back in the day” stories that are as stifling as the Alabama heat, it’s a shame that the rhythm kicks in too late.

Glover is requisitely weather beaten and has a back story hinting at a darker past that keeps him intriguing throughout. His grouchy persona is countered by some lively supporting turns that bring a light touch to proceedings, injecting the saggy mid-section with a faster beat, Charles S. Dutton (Alien3) and Stay Keach (Prison Break) stand-out as bar-fly and sheriff respectively and are each given the choice lines – “my wife’s cooking would gag a maggot”.

Top of the Pops however are the two newcomers; genuine string plucking talent Gary Clark Jr as the prodigious Sonny Blake, his performance is as endearing as the antiques roadshow style guitar that he carries in his case, and Yaya Dacosta as the radiant China Doll, both display the exuberance of youth through the medium of music to winning effect.

The uneven tone is supported by some ridiculous plot mechanisms that undermine Sayles whimsical history lesson, none more so than Tyrone’s meetings with the ghostly apparition of a “blind old jazz man” that feel like they belong in a different movie altogether. That said, Honeydripper falls into the “they don’t make ‘em like they used to” school of feel good moviemaking that wears its filmmakers passion on its sleeve, and that’s all too rare.