Product Details

• Actors: Jessica Lange, Ed Harris, Ann Wedgeworth, David Clennon, James Staley
• Directors: Karel Reisz
• Writers: Robert Getchell
• Producers: Bernard Schwartz, Charles Mulvehill
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, NTSC
• Rated: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Hbo Home Video
• VHS Release Date: December 29, 1998
• Run Time: 115 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (77 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 1558035745
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #58,998 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com essential video

She wasn't a beauty queen, but country-music star Patsy Cline's voice was a thing of wonder: full-bodied, aching and dreamy at the same time. She came by the torchy emotions in her songs honestly, as shown in this biopic directed by Karel Reisz, rising from poor surroundings, literally forcing her talent on the Nashville establishment, all the while trying to survive an abusive marriage to a drinker. Though the script by Robert Getchell is standard Hollywood biography, the movie is more than watchable, thanks to a bone-deep performance by the always astonishing Jessica Lange and the counterpoint by Ed Harris as her loving but unreliable husband. The soundtrack features a basketful of Cline's hits, which Lange convincingly lip-synchs. --Marshall Fine

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars CALLING ALL PATSY CLINE FANS..., February 3, 2001

By 

Lawyeraau (Balmoral Castle) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Sweet Dreams [VHS] (VHS Tape)

This movie, featuring great performances by Jessica Lange as Patsy Cline, and Ed Harris as Charley Dick, Cline's husband, chronicles the life and times of Patsy Cline, her rise to stardom, and her all too brief hold on it.

Jessica Lange gives a wonderful, believable performance as Patsy Cline. Ed Harris, as her hard drinking, womanizing, and ultimately abusive husband, plays his role to perfection. John Goodman has a small role in the film as Charley Dick's good ol' boy, meat head friend.

The movie shows how this poorly educated, young woman with a throaty and achingly rich voice went on to become one of the greatest crossover talents ever to come out of Nashville. Her flame burned brightly for several years, until it was extinguished when a plane in which she was a passenger crashed headlong into a mountain.

Her music runs throughout the entire film. If you are not a Patsy Cline fan when you first sit down to view this film, then you surely will be by the time you finish doing so. No one sang with more feeling than Patsy Cline, and she evidently lived her life the same way. This is a terrific movie and well worth watching!

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Performances Make The Film Work, September 17, 2003

By 

Gary F. Taylor "GFT" (Biloxi, MS USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Sweet Dreams (DVD)

Reality is generally more complicated than any motion picture can possibly convey--and such is the case with SWEET DREAMS, the 1985 bio-pic of singer Patsy Cline, which ran into a firestorm of criticism at the time of its release. For Patsy Cline was not a figure from the remote past. She and her life were extremely well recalled by family, friends, and co-workers, and one and all attacked the film as an extremely inaccurate portrait of her, her husband Charlie, and her life and career.

To a certain extent, the validity of these complaints about the film are a matter of opinion. But it does seem likely that the script softened Cline's harder edges and over-emphasized the stormy nature of her marriage in order to cast her in the role of victim. What isn't opinion is the way the film treats her career: it didn't happen like that, and while the film presents her as a great star at the time of her death in truth she had released only a handful of widely distributed records by 1963--and while some of them were big hits, they weren't quite as big as you might think. Even the celebrated "Sweet Dreams" never made it to the top spot on any music chart, and it was not until well after her death that she received full recognition for her remarkable work.

So instead of truth, or even a good approximation of it, SWEET DREAMS gives us the legend, the folk tale of the rough-and-tumble girl with the big, emotional voice who came from no where, married an abusive husband, and leaped into stardom that was cut short by an untimely death. And as legend, the film works very well.

The weak point of the film is the script, which plays largely to a "domestic drama" aspect and tends to smooth out the characters in a "santized for your protection" sort of way. The direction and cinematography are no great shakes either, and ultimately SWEET DREAMS looks very much like a made-for-television movie. But the cast carries it off in fine style. Jessica Lang looks no more like Patsy Cline than I do, and her lip-scynchs to Cline's work is rather hit-and-miss, but she gives a truly memorable performance; Ed Harris equals her in the role of husband Charlie, and together they create a synergy that has tremendous power. The supporting cast is also quite good, with Ann Wedgeworth a standout in the role of Cline's mother Hilda.

And then there is that soundtrack. Even if you've heard all these songs a thousand times, they're still worth hearing again. Patsy Cline was truly an amazing artist. But the film does something odd with them: the bulk of the story is set during the 1950s, but there is not a 1950s-era Cline vocal to be heard in the entire film, everything is taken from her glory years at MCA between 1960 and 1963. And very often it seemed to me that the original scoring of Cline's songs had been replaced with new arrangements.

And that, ultimately, is rather typical of the film as a whole. Just a little change here, just a little inaccuracy there, and while they all seem slight individually, they add up to a fairly significant distortion collectively. The performances make it worth watching, and they bring it in at a solid four stars. But if you're expecting anything more than the glossy legend of Patsy Cline, you won't find it here.

--GFT (Amazon.com Reviewer)--

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Movie! Great Performances!!, January 19, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sweet Dreams (DVD)

I didn't know much about Patsy kline or her music before seeing this movie, but when I first saw it about 10 years ago, I was blown away. The performances of the actors, Both Jessica Lange and Ed Harris, were incredible, and although it was a typical hollywood biography (as someone else stated in their posting)it was still a great movie. I have recently purchased the DVD after seeing it on cable the other night. I highly recommend it.