When those of us under the age of 45 think of Johnny Cash, we usually think of his recent work. We may recall his crusades with Billy Graham or his startlingly affecting last single, a cover of the Nine Inch Nails song “Hurt.” Or maybe, we even think of the Social Distortion cover of the Cash hit “Ring of Fire” that was popular when I was in high school. In other words, when we of the post-Vietnam generations recall the late Johnny Cash, we recall the Man in Black, who long ago ceased being a mere mortal and had, even before his death, already passed into myth.

Walk the Line sweeps aside that legend and introduces us to the Johnny Cash our parents and grandparents knew. It’s a thrilling, wonderful pleasure to meet him.

The film focuses on Cash’s life from his boyhood to his famous live recording at Folsom Prison in 1968. It’s the most tumultuous period in the singer’s life – long before Christ and June finally bring peace to his soul – as he rises from being the enlisted son of a sharecropper to a country and western music superstar.

Viewers not acquainted with this period will likely delight at seeing Elvis, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Cash touring the South as one boozing, rocking jamboree. But even more engaging is Cash’s pursuit of his life-long love, June Carter.

As a kind of plucky den mother to this rag-tag bunch of highway men, June is irresistibly drawn to Johnny but refuses to hitch her wagon to a no-account drug user - and a married one at that. On finding the boys still drunk after an all-night bender, she lets loose, hollering at the group, “Can’t none of y’all walk the line!” But it’s clear her words are meant mostly for John. This sets the stage for their decade-long courtship in which Cash loses his soul to drinking, drugs, and longing for June and finds his only salvation when they’re performing together on stage.

Joaquin Phoenix, who does his own singing, packs every moment he shares the spotlight with June with romantic tension. With every note and guitar strum, we see that he knows the only place he can have June all to himself is in front of an audience. Phoenix may not be quite as charismatic as Cash himself, but he comes about as close as any actor can.

Likewise, Reese Witherspoon turns in the best performance of her career as June Carter. Going in, it was hard to imagine that Hollywood could give us more than an excessively down-homey, country-bumpkin in Carter. But Witherspoon’s character is a smart, witty, full-bodied woman who tries not to let her passions lead her to making rash decisions but doesn’t always succeed – the kind of woman who could pen the lyrics for her husband’s future hit, “Ring of Fire.”

However, while executed superbly, it must be admitted that these elements are hardly new territory for a biopic. Many musicians struggle with tough childhoods and substance abuse. More than a few need the love of a good woman to put ‘em right (though, of course, few then remain faithfully devoted for the next 35 years). But what is new territory is taking the public’s perception of an icon and casting it in a different light, so that we have a new understanding of his or her work.

Usually films about the famous offer private moments that support the subject’s public persona. For example, audiences already knew Ray Charles as the genius, so Ray the movie, step by step, endeavors to show why the moniker was accurate. Continued...