Hearts of the West

I love movies about making movies. Nickelodeon, The Stunt Man, Singin’ in the Rain, Ed Wood, 8½, Day For Night, Adaptation … these movies vary in quality, and some of them are completely wrong about how movies actually get made, but I enjoyed them all. And the earlier the better. This one takes place around 1930, with sound just coming in, and stars a very young Jeff Bridges as a naïve Iowan who wants to write westerns, and gets involved working at a super-low-budget studio cranking out 12-part serials on budgets of around $1000. Or maybe $100. It’s uneven, but I enjoyed it.