At the same time, Altman makes the detail-specific, the incidental, and the intimate seem profound. Nashville transcends its environment even as it captures it so closely; it tells a story about the bitter end road of aspiration, the uselessness of celebrity, and the flagrant stupidity of a political system that increasingly resembles that same celebrity culture.
An indelible ending
That there is also shown to be underlying violence in that system is unsurprising – at Nashville’s climax, a gunman opens fire at the Walker fundraising concert, shooting an innocent Barbara Jean down on the stage in front of an audience. Cinema and political assassinations became curiously intertwined in the 1970s and early 1980s, from movies that inspired assassination attempts (Taxi Driver) to assassinations that inspired movies (The Parallax View).
In the indelible conclusion of the film, Barbara Harris provides a haunting, soulful rendition of a song, It Don’t Worry Me, to soothe the chaotic audience after Barbara Jean is rushed to hospital and the gunman is apprehended. They soon join along with her anthem, a pliant croon of reassurance and repetition that seems to comfort the shell-shocked observers. Cinematographer Paul Lohmann’s camera jumps between individuals, mostly corn-fed white faces – a real-life audience serving as extras, so the apocryphal story goes.