Anyone watch this? Thoughts?

Country music isn't big in Belgium, but the succes of this movie triggered peoples' interest in especially the blue grass music. The soundtrack has been number one in the charts for a few weeks.

The film got a lot of good reviews over here. Personally I thought it was decent; pretty good acting, I loved the music and the use of flashbacks was a smart move. I'm an atheïst myself but when Didier began to talk about cell research, George Bush, the nonexistence of God... I mean, those scenes really dragged on and on and on. It just didn't add up to the rest of the movie.

I gave it a solid 7/10.

Yes, nine out of ten - see it.

I just watched it and I think it is a masterpiece. I was emotionally affected by this love story and family story. It is one of the saddest films I've seen in a long time and left me a bit depressed but also hopeful about the redeeming qualities of love. Acting was brilliant.

A great, great powerful film.

I, being from Belgium, like American country music as much as any American does. The fact that I know English as well as my native language probably helps.

Also, a person from Belgium is called a Belgian. Just say "person from (country)" when you know you haven't learned the right words yet.

Very touchy,and yet - very sad.
Being never a fan of bluegrass, this music here is very in place, trying to soft a very tragic dark scenario.
I was waiting for any light coming, at least one, in the end. But it seems to me, that it was an idea to show, that even the ones who pray were forgotten by God.
But in general, it is very very quality work. I gave them 8 of 10.

I'm an American bluegrass musician visiting in France. Someone recommended this film to me this evening. Bluegrass from Belgium? I will spare contempt prior to investigation as I have heard one or two people say they enjoyed the film, including some user reviews here.
However, there's not much I can't stand more than to hear a non-native put on a phony southern accent or play phony southern music. The sentiment is wonderful and it's a gift that there is such enthusiasm for our music in Europe. But I found a link to soundbites of the soundtrack for "Alabama Monroe" on Deezer and I vomited a little the same way I did when I endured Nicole Kidman's horrific interpretation of a 19th century rich girl from South Carolina in "Cold Mountain"
I know I'm not alone to find this kind of vapid patronisation of southern culture repulsive and somewhat insulting. It will be hard for me to sit thru this film no matter how good the story and the acting is because the music is absolute masturbatory watered down dreck.

Just watched it a few days ago at the Thessaloniki Film Festival. It's very much Americanized in its aesthetic, yet very European at the same time in its sentiment. A truly touching movie with top-class performances, one of my top 3 movies from this year's festival.

About the music, well... I'm not exactly a fan of country music, but the way the two of them sang together - just beautiful. Perhaps to an accustomed ear the accents might seem a bit odd but to me they seemed fine.

8/10

-Goodnight, mother of six!
-Goodnight, father of two!

I was falling in love with this movie by the end of the first hour, and then it goes completely off the rails in a way that betrays these lovely characters.

This has got two lead actors with sexy chemistry, good music, atmosphere. It has a story worth seeing played from beginning to end, but this director is just screwing around with us.

At a few different points in that last third I felt like the rug kept getting pulled out from underneath me and would find myself wondering how we just got to where we got. And then two minutes later we'd be back to that original place that had made sense to me before.

Why does he do that to us?! I was getting so invested with these people. What happens to their lives is serious business. It's personal. It deserves sensitivity and care. I feel like this director didn't trust what he had before him, which is so peculiar because he's got characters we really like.

Where this screenplay takes the father seems false to me. He goes to an extreme behavior out of nowhere. But maybe it wouldn't seem out of nowhere if we got to actually follow him around as a person rather than setting up a scene only to cut to the middle of another scene and then double back again, for no apparent reason.

I'm not sure what you people thought of that last scene, but I found it kind of ridiculous. Would you really assemble the band in that spot at that time with what's going on?

I feel like this movie led me on. It's not fair. I really liked that young family. The goods are with watching that young family develop, but all I got instead were snapshots of their lives and confounding editing tricks.

I'm mixed on this one.