The Miner's Daughter

Scan page 9

Country music buff TONY RICHARDSON reviews 'The Coal Miner's Daughter', a film directed This film is really about Loretta Lyn, the "first lady of country music". But it begins as a picture of the life of a Kentucky coal miner, his wife and daughter.

For Loretta, the daughter, the only way out of grinding poverty and misery is to break out of her home environment.

The hard work, the killer dust from the mine, the low wages all spent in the company store, are well depicted in the film.

One memorable scene highlights the poverty of the family as the camera moves from the darkness of the mine to the darkness of the house in which the wife is at work.

The children wear shoes only in the winter, and it is a big treat for Loretta when, at the age of 14, she gets a new dress.

Their only entertainment is an occasional barn dance and the 'Grand Ol' Opry' on the radio.

But even in this film which focusses on one person who escaped from poverty there is the tendency-all too evident in country music-to take pride in poverty.

Loretta's husband, fresh out of the army, declares that he is not going to be a minerthough he wants to stay with Loretta.

It takes a moonshiner (soon to be shot dead) to point out to him that in the harsh world of the Kentucky mountains 'If you don't become a miner you either moonshine or move on down the line". . He is forced to become a miner.

They get married-and Loretta starts having the tirst of her four children. She is headed down the same course as her heavily oppressed mother.

But her husband makes a break-heads to Washington and becomes a tractor dirver, later to send for Loretta and the children.

Her escape from the Kentucky coalfields has still left her isolated in the home. Her story makes up the second half of the film.

It is indeed the first half which is most interesting for a socialist.

Yet the poverty of the miners is not once shown in any class setting: no strikes or union activity take place. All that is depicted is family solidarity-in keeping with the ideal bourgeois concept of the family unit.

The strength of this is thatunusually for a film-it does for once show people who have to work for a living.

But even in this respect it appears to be used largely as a counter-weight to show how high Loretta subsequently climbs.

Her escape from the oppres sion of child care and domestic toil comes when her husband buys her a guitar as an anniversary present and pushes her into singing professionally.

Given the opportunity, she climbs to the top. The remainder of the film follows the wellworn theme of the problems of rising to stardom: the sacrifices and the pressures of continual touring, the death in a plane crash of Loretta's friend and fellow country star Patsy Cline, and of course the old story of money not resolving personal problems.

Loretta's husband is reduced to an appendage of her-confined to the home. Of course all relationships are distorted under capitalism.

The relieving , factor in this half of the film is the music of Loretta Lyn, Patsy Cline and Kentucky miners Merle Haggard.

Another bright spot is the acting of Cissy Spacek, whose versatility in performances as characters from 14 to 40 is astounding.

Country music butts, Cissy Spacek tans and those looking for a moving portrayal of conditions in US mining districts will all find something to savour in this film.

Scan page 10

DON'T GO INRO DESTRIAL NEWS THE FIGHT BLINDFOLD!

MERSEYSIDE FACTORY CLOSURES Fisher Bendix Leyland Dunlop Meccano fril Why campaigns Ing 100 were lost & jabow they can be WOn 55227:

Mathi sAt. • CATAL