Featuring an all-star ensemble cast, meticulous pacing, and a demonstration in the fine art of blending comedy, drama and ambient dialogue, there's no mistaking who directed A Prairie Home Companion. Robert Altman's final film possesses each of the signature elements associated with his filmmaking style. It's not his best film, nor most groundbreaking; but now that the knowledge it was his last work has sank in, Companion has inescapably become one his most important films.Yesterday Altman would have been 82. He never won an Oscar for directing, but he was nominated six times and received an honorary award from the Academy just last year. A Prairie Home Companion is an excellently crafted film with each of the players on top of their game. The film is about death, endings and last shows. It possesses both humor and tragedy and makes me smile just thinking about it.
The DVD is great, if you're an Altman fan, go buy it; it's essential to your collection.
Garrison Keilor worked closely with Altman on this film and he wrote a sort-of eulogy a while back, here's the link. And here's an article from today's New York Times about a recent tribute to Altman attended by many of the actors who had worked with him.
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