Blue Sky
Released September 1994
Starring Jessica Lange (as Carly Marshall), Tommy Lee Jones, Powers Booth, Carrie Snodgress, Chris O'Donnell, Amy Locane, Anna Klemp, Mitch Ryan
Directed by Tony Richardson
101 min.Box Office gross - $3.3 million
See complete credits at Internet Movie Database
Considering Blue Sky’s checkered past, it is amazing that this film ever got released let alone win Jessica Lange an Oscar for Best Actress. The director, British veteran Tony Richardson, died shortly after the film was completed in 1991. And Orion Pictures, the production company, went bankrupt and the film sat in the studios vaults until it was finally released in 1994. Despite all the bad luck, Blue Sky was worth the wait.
Featuring extraordinary performances by Lange and Tommy Lee Jones, it is the story of an army engineer and his volatile wife on an Alabama military base during the 50s. Jones plays Hank who helps conduct nuclear weapons testing. His wife, Carly, is a baby doll temptress who fantasizes about being one of the beautiful movie stars that she idolizes. Carly is also emotionally unstable and her longing for attention usually lands her and her family in hot water. Her glamour and flirtatious behavior attracts men like magnets and, unfortunately for Hank, she is usually not strong enough to divert their advances. A fellow wife on the base tells Carly, “Women like you are the reason men like women in the first place.” But Carly must get her act together when her husband is involved in a nuclear accident cover-up and is falsely committed to a mental hospital.
Blue Sky is a small film that carries a mixed bag of plot elements but it somehow works in the end. It also has a very good feel for life in the 1950s. Above all, it is a character driven drama that works because of the incredible performances. Jessica Lange deservedly won the Oscar for a difficult role that could have become a caricature in the hands of a less experienced actress. Tommy Lee Jones is equally good and should also have received a nomination for his work here. The supporting players are also excellent - Amy Locane and Anna Klemp as the Marhsall’s daughters, and Powers Booth as a military captain smitten with Carly. And as Booth’s wife, Carrie Snodgress is memorable and has one of the best lines in the film when she tells Carly -“You mean just one less Christmas card to me.”
Blue Sky was filmed in Selma, Alabama and Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Critical Sampling:
"Lange has the showy role, with almost unlimited opportunities to emote and strut her stuff, which she does magnificently and with total abandon." - Variety