The Black Hole of "Nashville"
The multiple characters and storylines of the film finally wind up intersecting and coalescing around the big black hole of Nashville: the Presidential candidacy of Hal Philip Walker. Ironically, in a film where the marketing—including the opening credits fake “commercial”—revolves heavily around the fact that it features 24 “major” characters (though some are far more “major” than others), the one figure who is not presented on-screen is the one character responsible for those other 24 crossing paths.
There’s Very Little “Nashville” in Nashville
Nashville is the center of the universe when it comes to country music. Another element of the film’s marketing was that the actors given the job of composing their own songs. That may well be true, but that does not mean that the actors responded with country music. Genre is a fluid thing, of course, and one person’s definition may not be another, but with only a few exceptions, it is very difficult to define the bulk of the original songs sung in the movie as Nashville-style country of the 1970’s. LA-style country rock and folk music, sure, but the truth is that precious few of the songs in the movie could ever have fit into a country music station at the time without sounding out of place.
Stardom by Irony
Albuquerque Winifred is, like Sueleen, an unknown who desperately wants to become a country music star. Little argument can be made that Albuquerque possesses a much greater talent than Sueleen, but the ironic reality is that the only reason she is almost certain to become the next big Nashville star is that she happened to be in the right place at the right time: near a microphone when Barbara Jean is assassinated.
“Someone Kinda Special”
The most heartbreakingly ironic scene in the film may be when Tom introduces his signature song (which would go on to win an Oscar), “I’m Easy” with a spoken dedication: “I'm gonna dedicate this to someone kinda special who just might be here tonight.” In the audience are at least four women that the audiences knows he either has already been intimate with or is in the process of seducing into intimacy and each of them believes they are that one and only “kinda special person.”
Ironic Foreshadowing
The most ironic example of foreshadowing in the film comes after Sueleen’s humiliating forced striptease when Wade is forced into trying tough love to get her to see that she is chasing a dream that will never be realized in a million years. Ever oblivious, Sueleen counters with a wager that is ominous in its own ironically oblivious way: “Yeah. You wanna make a bet? You wanna just come to the Parthenon and watch me sing with Barbara Jean? You just come and watch Wade.”
