If you know anything about the real Johnny Cash you will know that his fame and popularity was never about how musically talented he was; it was more about who he was. Joaquin Phoenix' portrayal of Cash not only succeeds in allowing us to know him, but it is so spot on that you eventually forget its Phoenix in the first place; he becomes Cash in this role. Jonny Cash may not have been the greatest vocalist who ever lived, but this does not diminish Phoenix talents in the slightest; the man can sing. An identical compliment must be paid to Reese Witherspoon who, like Phoenix, is almost unidentifiable in this role after a few minutes. Her portrayal of June Carter, in my view, transformed her from someone recognizably famous to someone recognizably talented.

The script here is simply remarkable. Screenwriters  Gill Dennis and James Mangold have never written anything that I was in loved with or even liked very much (Girl Interrupted, Return To Oz, etc.), maybe a more down to earth story is just what the doctor ordered for them. All I know is that every scene was true to life. I pretty much knew what was going to happen in every scene, but there was never a moment where I thought I could predict what anyone was going to say next, and I was never conscious of the fact that anything was being scripted.

The problems with this film are minor, two in particular immediately come to mind. The pace of this film is so fast you find yourself wondering at times whether you have missed something. Time flies by in this film and it is sometimes hard to keep track of what state Cash's life is in now, or how famous he is today compared with the last scene. The pace is so speedy that it gets to the point where if there was a caption which read "one year later" at the beginning of this scene, you could count on there being the same caption at the beginning of the next one. This does nothing to tarnish the experience of Walk The Line, it simply confuses it at times.

Lastly, I have not been able to put my finger on what it is yet, but there was something out of place with Robert Patrick's performance as the father. I noticed this by the first scene he was in. Cash's brother is tragically killed in an accident involving a saw, and we get a nearly stock scene involving Patrick telling Cash he is nothing and that God took the wrong son. This is the only scene in the film that I thought was genuinely bad. This did not feel like a father grieving over a lost child, it did not feel like a father blaming the other child, it just felt like Patrick showed up that day to do the scene. I can't really explain it any better than that, and if that didn't make any sense to you, feel free to call it my problem.

Johnny Cash's music was never really about the music; it was more about the experience. Exactly the same can be said about this film. Like Cash himself, it takes something familiar and makes it strangely new. I highly recommend this film. Go for the story, but stay for the outstanding performances.