The Return of Tanya Tucker: Featuring Brandi Carlile

This film was playing at our art house cinema and while I can appreciate most forms of music, I was aware of Tanya Tucker but knew little else about her life and career.

For the most part, the film focusses on Brandi Carlile's adoration of Tanya Tucker's work and her efforts to bring Tanya back to into the limelight for the appreciate of her original fans and to gain the recognition she feels is warranted for a true country music icon. Brandi Carlile, a gifted musician in her own right, opens the film with her initial efforts to contact Tanya and convince her to produce a new country album. Most of the film focusses on her working with a somewhat hesitant Tanya on the new album with occasional glimpses back into Tanya's budding career when she started singing at venues like country fairs in her early teens.

While the bulk of the film focusses on the production of a new country album, it does go on to include the effort required to bring Tanya back for a live performance and without giving away any spoilers, the national recognition achieved for Brandi and Tanya's effort.

While the film does hint at the reasons for Tanya's 15 year hiatus from the country music scene, I feel the one criticism would be that it didn't explore that aspect of her life very much leaving viewers to possibly question the circumstances that led to her dropping out of the music scene.

Overall, I think it is a worthwhile & interesting watch to learn more about another music legend who came from such a poor background and became wildly successful at such an early age.

I knew a little about Tanya Tucker so I was interested to watch this. What I did not expect was the incredible story of Brandi Carlile and her efforts to put this all together. I'm a person that can "read" into people imo. I was struck by the goodness of Brandi and her true desire to help her childhood idol not rest in faded glory. I truly think her motives were altruistic. This led me to look into her career a bit and by so doing discovering her great gift as singer/songwriter. This was well done and did not pitch Tanya for Sainthood, but as older, perhaps just as crusty version of her earlier self. It's a feel good story. What worked for me is seeing the goodness in Brandi, her interactions with others, and discovering her great talent. I watched wanting to know more about Tanya and left with newfound respect for Tanya and a new heroine on many fronts in Brandi. Good people do still exist.

I'll admit that there were some really *aha* moments in this film which I won't spoil for you here.

I thoroughly enjoyed it. I especially loved how they wove the couple lines of the unfinished (gut wrenching) song. It's a nice arc that worked for me.

I'm sure there's more to the story here in the long hiatus, but it's none of our business and I appreciate that they didn't delve into all of that.

The film felt a bit more balanced towards Brandi than Tanya, so at times it was hard to figure out what the documentary was actually about. Was it about Brandi? Was it about Tanya? Was it about their relationship? Honestly...there is a business end to this thing that kind of just hangs out there. In one scene I think it was Brandi who said something like "lord knows there is no money in this". I loathe when successful people say stuff like this.

Regardless, it's a good watch and worth the time invested.