What's the definition of a predictable movie? Obviously, it's a movie where the audience knows what's going to happen before it occurs. If you watch a lot of movies within a certain genre, this can easily happen. (For example, I'm rarely surprised by horror movies, as I've seen them all.) But, what if you're watching a movie from a genre which you rarely visit and you still know exactly what is going to happen from moment-to-moment? What would you call that? You'd call that Crazy Heart.

Jeff Bridges stars in Crazy Heart as country singer Bad Blake. Although he had some success early in his career, Bad is old and broken down. He travels across the southwest by himself in a beat-up SUV playing small bars and bowling alleys. His manager (Paul Herman) attempts to get Bad better gigs, but he refuses. He also refuses to work with his former partner/protege Tommy Sweet (Colin Farrell), who has risen to the top of the charts. Bad seems content to go from town-to-town, staying drunk most of the time. At one stop, he is interviewed by local newspaper writer Jean Craddock (Maggie Gyllenhaal). Despite the fact that Bad is old and surly, there are sparks between them. Bad begins to spend time with Jean and her young son Buddy (Jack Nation). However, Bad's old habits begin to get in his way. Is there anyway that this old dog can turn over a new leaf?

Crazy Heart is the kind of small, indie movie which could have easily slipped into semi-obscurity, but the performance of Jeff Bridges garnered a great deal of attention, going on to score an Oscar and a Golden Globe for the veteran actor. Did he deserve it? Well, that depends on how you view acting. There's certainly no argument that Bridges immerses himself into the role and he's very believable as this man who has reached the end of the road. There's nothing glamorous about Bad and Bridges really brings him to life. He doesn't go over the top and make Bad brash and loud -- he's simply an old man who just doesn't care anymore.

As noted above, Crazy Heart is a very predictable movie. (It's ironic that Robert Duvall is in the film and served as one of the producers, because the movie seems very similar to Duvall's 1983 film Tender Mercies.) This sort of drama isn't my cup of tea, but I knew everything that was going to happen. We've seen characters like Bad before, and each move that he makes is telegraphed throughout the movie. (If the movie had wanted to shock us with a plot twist, it could have shown Bad taking a shower.) But, the predictability actually works in the film's favor. Knowing that Bad is going to sabotage everything in his life creates a certain sense of suspense, as we are just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Predictability and unoriginality are one thing, but Crazy Heart really becomes a head-scratcher when it comes to the relationship between Bad and Jean. This section of the film really hit too close to home, as it reminded me of the time when I fell in love with an alcoholic, chain-smoking country singer who was twice my age. Oh, wait a minute, that didn't happen, and I didn't believe it in this movie. This relationship gets serious really fast and never, ever feels genuine. This is more than the typical older man, younger woman relationship which usually makes us roll our eyes. This one is simply gross and my reaction to it consistently pulled me out of the movie.

In many ways, Crazy Heart is no better than a made-for-cable movie, as it's leisurely-paced and again, quite predictable. But, the acting is good and the movie features some great scenery. As for the music, I can't comment on that, because I hate country and fast-forwarded through all of the songs. Here's my final thought -- given the fact that we know that Bad is bad and the questionable nature of the relationship between Bad and Jean, you can either put on a shirt which is a size too small or watch Crazy Heart. Either way, you're going to be uncomfortable.

Crazy Heart urinates in a bottle on Blu-ray Disc courtesy of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment. The film has been letterboxed at 2.35:1 and the Disc contains an AVC 1080p HD transfer which runs at an average of 32 Mbps. The image is very sharp and clear, showing only a small amount of grain and no defects from the source material. The landscape scenes look awesome and these images have a great amount of depth. The colors look good and the image is never overly dark or bright. The Disc features a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track which runs at 48 kHz and an average of 4.0 Mbps. The track delivers clear dialogue and sound effects. The stereo effects are detailed and show a nice amount of separation. The surround sound effects during the concerts are very well-done, placing us in the middle of the crowd. What little of the music I could stomach sounded great, having a ton of presence.

The Crazy Heart Blu-ray Disc contains only three extras. "Deleted Scenes and Alternate Music Cuts" contains ten entries which run 28 minutes. Most of these are simple dialogue scenes in which the characters talk about things which we could have easily inferred from other moments in the movie. But, there is one scene which is very pivotal -- I can understand if it was cut for length, but it would have actually helped the movie. There's also a late scene which could play as sort of an alternate ending which was cut. "Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, & Robert Duvall on What Brought Them to Crazy Heart" (3 minutes) is exactly what it sounds like, as the three actor discuss their involvement in the film, as actors and beyond. The final extra is the THEATRICAL TRAILER for the movie.