William Sanderson

In 1930, Jericho, a backwater Texan town 50 miles from the Mexican border, two crime syndicates, the Italian mob led by Fredo Strozzi (Ned Eisenberg), and the Irish mob led by "Mr. Doyle" (David Patrick Kelly), compete for control of the lucrative border smuggling pipeline. The authorities have been ineffective at keeping the peace, and have have stopped trying. The current Sheriff, Ed Galt (Bruce Dern), actually seems to be exploiting the conflict for personal gain. John Smith (Bruce Willis), a self-described loner without a conscience, enters Jericho and immediately gets into trouble through a careless glance at Doyle's girl Felina (Karina Lombard). Doyle's henchman, Finn (Patrick Kilpatrick), notices Smith ogling Felina and confronts him. After some mutual trash talk, Finn smashes the windshield of Smith's car and slashes his tires, then casually directs him to the Sheriff's office. Smith pays a visit to Sheriff Galt and his mute deputy, Bob, who refuse to get involved. Galt advises Smith to buy a gun. Smith enters the town saloon, finding it empty except for the owner - Joe Monday (William Sanderson), and orders a whiskey. He takes a set of guns from his pack, and walks back across the street to the Irish HQ to have a word with Finn. John asks tentatively if he will cover the damages. Finn draws first - but is sent flying across the street with a few bullets in his chest. Smith shoots up the place - the others don't move. Soon, Strozzi offers Smith a job on his team. Smith gets a room at the Italian controlled Hotel, and free meals. Smith meets Strozzi's attractive girlfriend, Lucy (Alexandra Powers), and learns more about Doyle's most fearsome enforcer, Hickey (Christopher Walken). At a communal meal for all Strozzi's men, Giorgio (Michael Imperioli) Strozzi's bad tempered cousin, arrives late - and immediately takes a dislike to Smith. Smith leaves, and returns to the saloon. He becomes dissastisfied with Strozzi's leadership style, and it is implied that Strozzi and Giorgio are incompetent. That night, while spending time with the prostitute Wanda (Leslie Mann), the Irish plan a hit on Smith - but he manages to kill both assassins. Smith was set-up by Wanda. She is hysterical. He knocks her out, and later learns that she was blackmailed. He leaves her to be arrested by Galt. Soon, Smith is summoned to a hideout in the middle of the desert by Strozzi, a roadside diner. They plan a hit on Doyle's next shipment from Mexico... At the border, Smith is given the job to approach the convoy of trucks. He offers the Mexican commandant in charge, Ramirez, an offer to turn on Doyle's men. The Mexicans take it up - and massacre the Irish men under their protection. Later, Smith pays to release Wanda from the cells, and gives her money to take the next bus out of town. He gives a tip to the Sheriff about the convoy heist, and hears another story about Hickey. Back in Lucy's room, Smith offers money for information on Strozzi, and seduces her. Soon enough, Doyle and another of his henchmen, Jack (R.D. Call), attempt to hire Smith to assassinate Strozzi, as his position inside Strozzi's gang makes him perfect. Smith expresses discomfort at the offer and Doyle misinterprets this as a rejection. So Smith decides to play both sides. He quits working for Strozzi. Strozzi pulls a gun on Smith, angrily reminding him "nobody quits me." Smith beats up Giorgio, and then engages Strozzi in an armed standoff. Convinced that Giorgio is a "halfwit" that's not worth dying for, Strozzi stands down. For his next move, Smith does his best to stay sober a few days as he waits for Hickey to show. He learns from the mechanic that Giorgio has been snooping around, trying to get the dirt on him. Smith delivers a tip to Giorgio - to watch out for Ramirez, in case he turns sides again. Giorgio takes the bait and leaves for Mexico. Smith then tells the Irish where Giorgio will be, and also that he will be with the Mexicans that betrayed him - and stole his money and trucks. He is paid for the info, but still won't commit. He finally meets Hickey, who is immediately suspicious of him. Hickey returns to Mexico. He enters a cantina, shoots Ramirez, then a border patrol cop, and captures Giorgio. Meanwhile, Smith meets with Felina in an abandoned church to hear her story. Back in Jericho, Captain Pickett from the Texas Rangers arrives in town to warn Smith and the Sheriff that he is investigating the murder of the border cop. He will return in ten days with more Rangers - and will tolerate one gang in the town, but not two. And he wants Smith to be gone. Hickey returns - and offers a deal to Strozzi -- $100 grand and the trucks for Giorgio. At the drop-off Strozzi pulls a fast one - he has kidnapped Felina. They swap Giorgio for Felina as Smith looks on. It's war! Lucy meets with Smith, she tells him that Strozzi and Giorgio found out that she slept with him, and subsequently beat her and mutiliated one of her ears. Smith falls for her story, and gives her $500 to get the next bus out of town. Smith accepts Doyle's offer - but wants $1000 up front. He tells Doyle that he "heard a rumor" that Strozzi has more trigger men arriving in town that night, playing on Doyle's fears that Felina could be targeted again. Doyle sends Smith to the hideut where Felina is being kept. The place is heavily guarded. He steps in through the front door. Immediately, Doyle's men know something is up. Smith opens fire. He kills every last one of them. Smith puts Felina in a car, and tells her to flee across the border. She gives John her cross. Smith knows he should leave, but instead he waits at the hideout to deliver the bad news to Doyle. Doyle arrives the next morning, and believes his story that Felina was taken. He is devastated. But Hickey is on to him. Smith returns to Jericho, and takes a bath. Hickey drops by - someone had seen Felina over the border, where she had sold the car. In the room, they find her cross. Smith is taken to a basement over at Doyle's hideout. Jack and Hickey mercilessly beat Smith as Doyle talks about how he "saved" Felina from a crappy life in Mexico. When it becomes clear that Smith will not give up any information, he is left for dead. The next day two goons return - but Smith is missing. Suddenly he jumps out from a metal cabinet, and using the smaller man as a shield pumps about a dozen bullets into the larger thug. He escapes. Doyle's men try to find him. First he hides out in the saloon, in the walls behind slabs of ice. He relays some intel to Galt. Galt tells Doyle that Smith is at Slim's Roadhouse in the desert, but knowing really that the Italians are hiding there. Doyle's men set the building ablaze, and proceed to shoot everyone who attempts to escape the flames. Strozzi and Giorgio admit defeat, promising to leave town if they are spared, but Doyle's men coldly gun them down. The Irish assume that Smith has died in the blaze. Smith returns to the abandoned church to heal. Joe brings him food and bandages everyday, but soon enough the Irish catch onto this. Joe is taken and beaten. Galt finds Smith and tells him about Joe. Hickey and Doyle are in Mexico, still looking for Felina. John takes Galt's gun, and heads off to Strozzi's old hotel - where Joe is kept. On his way there, he picks up his lucky hat - and stops by the window of the Undertaker's - one of his few friends in town! Smith storms in to the hotel. Bad guys are blown away like they're on bungee ropes with the force of each gunshot. John follows Jack to an upstairs room -- inside is Joe, tied up. Joe motions with his eyes - and Smith shoots through a cabinet dresser. Jack falls out, dead. Smith has been shot - but just the once. He pours some whiskey on his wound. He leaves a tommy gun against the door as a message for Hickey, and tells Galt that he'll be at Slim's Roadhouse waiting. Everyone is leaving town - Galt to Houston, and even the Undertaker is getting away while he can! Smith and Joe wait at the burnt-out building. Doyle, Hickey, and Bob arrive the following morning. Joe hides. Doyle wants a truce. He is lovesick - and just wants to find his girl. Joe jumps out and shoots him dead in retaliation for ruining his town. Bob raises his shotgun, so Smith fires a few rounds into his body. Hickey drops his tommy gun. He walks away - he doesn't want to die in Texas. He asks Smith if he would shoot an unarmed man in the back. Smith tells him he's done a lot worse. Hickey pulls out a pistol and turns - but Smith shoots him in the head. Smith takes the cross from Doyle's lifeless hand, gets in the car, and leaves to continue his journey.

Kansas City 1933.Prohibition and the mobsters rule the streets.The number one crime boss is Leon Coll (Tony Lo Bianco),but Primo Pitt (Rip Torn) is determined to be top dog.One night at a cafe,Police Lieutenant Speer (Clint Eastwood) encounters his ex-partner turned Private eye Mike Murphy (Burt Reynolds) who gets into a fight with a pair of thugs.Speer's heard rumours about some dodgy dealings going on around at Murphy's agency and is convinced that the punch up had something to do with it.The next day at his office,Murphy's secetary Addy (Jane Alexander) who he and Speer have both always liked (and is possibly the reason for their feud) tells Murphy that the two thugs were in fact Repo guys.Murphy's partner Dehl Swift (Richard Roundtree) arrives flashing his money around,and Murphy becomes suspicious that his partner is up to no good. Dehl arrives at a club where his girlfriend Ginny Lee (Irene Cara) sings and gives Leon Coll's crooked book keeper $25,000 from Primo Pitt.Pitt wants all of Coll's accounts to use as evidence against him so that he can take over the streets.Ginny Lee worries that Dehl is getting in too deep when he tells her of his plan to double cross Pitt and sell Coll his books back to him for $50,000.Later at a boxing match,Speer is on a date with Addy when Dehl arrives to meet Coll.Dehl tells Coll that his book keeper betrayed him and Pitt will have enough to bring him down. Dehl goes home and Speer follows him.When Dehl arrives he finds Ginny Lee been held hostage by Pitt and his gang.Attempting to save her,Ginny Lee manages to escape but Dehl is killed.Speer kills one of the henchmen.Pitt manages to escape without been seen but without the books he wanted.At the morgue,Speer fills Murphy in on the incident.As he leaves,Coll's men pick Murphy up and tell him about the situation with Dehl and the books and that he wants them back.But it isn't long before Pitt pays him a visit as well and tells him he has his girlfriend Caroline (Madeline Kahn) hostage and that he wants the books. Speer discovers that the bullet found in Dehl's body matches the bullet from Pitt's gun and tells Murphy he wants to know Ginny Lee's whereabouts so she can testify.But Murphy secretly meets her so he can try and find out where Dehl has hidden the books.He soon realises that he had stashed them in the locker of a boxing gym.Pitt's men arrive to try and get hold of Ginny Lee but as she escapes she is hit by a car. Now in possession of the books,Murphy plans to get Caroline back but Pitt's men and Coll's men arrive at the same time and he finds himself caught up in a shootout.Speer arrives and reluctantly takes care of the situtation.Murphy tells him about Caroline,so Speer joins him at Pitt's hideout for the exchange of the books.Pitt tells them that Caroline is been held somewhere else.Murphy tells him in that in the case with the books is also some explosives.A shootout breaks out and Speer ends up killing Pitt. Speer and Murphy extract the whereabouts of Caroline from one of the thugs - at a brothel.They set out to get her back.But at the same time,Addy is taken hostage by Coll and his men at her apartment.Speer and Murphy gate crash the brothel and beat up Pitt's remaining men and rescue Caroline.As they leave,Coll drives up with Addy and tells the pair he wants the books.Addy gets out of the car and Murphy hands Coll the case with the books and explosives.As Coll and his men drive off,the car explodes. Some time later,Ginny Lee is back singing at the club and Murphy is on a date with Caroline,while Speer is dating Addy.A fight breaks out between Murphy and a few guys and after making Speer spill his drink,Speer gets him outside for a fight.The film ends with the two squaring up to each other and trading insults.

In a dystopian futuristic Los Angeles, the police department forces Rick Deckard out of retirement to hunt four genetically engineered humans on a killing spree.

In the town of Edna, Texas, in 1940, Nita Longley (Sissy Spacek) carries her infant, William Henry Longley, to a local bar and sees her husband, Harry Longley Sr., kissing another woman. Outside, she takes the hand of Harry Junior (Henry Thomas), her other son, and returns home. Four years later, in Gregory, Texas, Nita works as an operator for the Southwest Consolidated Telephone Company in a small house where she lives with her two sons. She types an application for a transfer and presents it to her boss, Mr. Rigby (R.G. Armstrong), when he arrives for the company receipts. Tired of being on-call day and night, Nita wants a secretarial job with regular hours. Her sons, Harry and William Henry (Carey Hollis Jr.), roam to a nearby bar, where brothers Calvin (William Sanderson) and Arnold Triplett (Tracey Walter) play a trick to get William Henry's trousers wet. The "raggedy man," (Sam Shepard) a dark, derelict figure wearing a hat over his scarred face, walks past them, dragging a lawn mower. Inside the bar, Calvin and Arnold discuss their chances of having sex with Nita Longley, figuring that a divorced woman must be as sex-starved as they were when they were cellmates at Huntsville Prison. After several drinks, the brothers drive to Nita's house in Calvin's pickup truck. Calvin goes to the door, but Nita claims the company allows no after hours visitors. Later, on a rainy night, a knock on the door awakens Nita. Outside, a sailor named Teddy Roebuck (Eric Roberts) claims the man at the gas station sent him to use the telephone. Nita lets him into an anteroom, where a telephone sits below a small window with a door. At the switchboard on the other side of the window, Nita rings Teddy through to Ardmore, Oklahoma. He tells his girlfriend's father he is hitchhiking home from boot camp on liberty, but the father informs him she has married another man. Nita offers the drenched sailor a cup of coffee to cheer him up. When the storm knocks out the electricity, they talk in the dark until lights are turned back on. Teddy thanks her and leaves, but as he walks away, he thinks he sees a dark man in a hat standing nearby in the rain. At sunrise, Harry and William Henry find Teddy curled up asleep on the front porch. Nita receives a telephone call from Washington, D.C., for Jean Lester, and sends her sons to bring the young woman to the telephone. A voice informs Jean that her husband was wounded, but he will be coming home from the war. As the tearful woman returns home, the raggedy man passes by, dragging his lawn mower. Teddy pulls Harry and William Henry in a red wagon and shows them how to fly a kite. When he gives Nita the string, she trips over him and they fall down together. Every time she tries to play with them, the telephone rings and she hurries back to the house. With nowhere to go, Teddy decides to spend the rest of his leave with Nita and the kids. Herman Callaway (Ed Geldart), a middle-aged man, comes to pay his telephone bill, but tells Nita that Teddy's presence "doesn't look good" in the eyes of Gregory's citizens. That night, the raggedy man stands outside Nita's house. At the bar, Calvin and Arnold try to telephone Nita, but Teddy, unfamiliar with the switchboard, innocently hangs up the call. Arnold expresses anger that Nita told them they were not allowed in the house at night, yet now she entertains a stranger. The next day, Teddy takes Harry and William Henry on a bus trip to Corpus Christi, Texas, where he treats them to a beach side carnival and a John Wayne war movie. At home, Nita gets her best dress out of the closet, flirts in a mirror, and dances to the radio as she sweeps the floor. That night, Calvin and Arnold peek in Nita's window and watch her bathing, but they run when the horn on Calvin's truck begins to blare. Nita telephones Sheriff Watson (Bill Thurman) to report a "peeping Tom." Looking around and finding nobody, the sheriff mentions that everyone is talking about the stranger staying at her house. He emphasizes that locals depend on her, especially now with a war on. When Nita mentions seeing a strange man in a hat hanging around, Sheriff Watson says he is a harmless drifter named Bailey, who has been around town for a couple of years, mowing lawns. Harry and William Henry, wearing little sailor suits, return later that night with Teddy, who brings Nita a set of rayon stockings. After she puts the boys to bed, Nita and Teddy dance to radio music, then kiss. She turns off the telephone switchboard, and the two make love. The next morning, as prim Miss Pud and Miss Beulah pass by, they are shocked when Teddy steps onto the front porch without a shirt. Nita asks him to be more discreet, because "I have to live here." Meanwhile, Arnold and Calvin lure William Henry into the bar, buy him an orange soda drink, and ask about his mother and Teddy. Harry tries to pull his little brother away, but the Tripletts grab him and ask if his mother gets naked with the stranger. Suddenly, Teddy arrives and fights with them, but when Arnold hits him with a pool stick, the bartender, Crecencio, ends the melee by firing his shotgun in the air. Later, Nita tends to Teddy's cuts and scrapes. She bemoans being trapped in Gregory, but she cannot quit. She asks Teddy to leave, for the sake of everyone. Teddy bids goodbye to the boys, and since they have polished his shoes, he tells them he has named one shoe Henry, for William Henry, and the other Harry, so that no matter where he goes, they will be with him. As Teddy hitches a ride out of town, Calvin and Arnold watch him go. Harry blames his mother for sending Teddy away, just like she drove away their father. He wants to live with his daddy, but she reminds Harry that his father has never returned for him. That night, Nita telephones Mr. Rigby. When he comes to the house in the morning, she shows him the application for a transfer she is sending to the company personnel office in San Antonio, Texas. Rigby becomes angry, tells her she is "frozen" in her job, and insists that everyone else is also making sacrifices for the war. Nita knows all about the war, who is wounded, and who is not coming home, because every telephone call goes through her. When she telephones the company personnel office, Mr. Rigby disconnects her. Nita walks out the door and buys three one-way bus tickets to San Antonio from the local agent. Returning to the house, she finds Rigby indignant that she left him alone with the switchboard. That evening, Nita and the boys pack their possessions. Before going to bed, Harry goes to the outhouse in back, but Calvin locks him in. Arnold knocks on Nita's door and claims he needs to use the telephone. She lets him into the hall, but locks her door to the house interior. However, Calvin breaks in through the back, unplugs the telephone system, and grabs her. As the brothers assault Nita, the lights go out. Somebody outside starts Calvin's truck, honks the horn, and aims its lights at the front porch. Arnold steps outside with a knife to investigate, and the raggedy man hits him. Nita shakes loose from Calvin, locking him outside. Calvin runs to the outhouse to grab Harry, but the raggedy man kills him, allowing Harry to rejoin his mother. As Nita steps onto the front porch, Arnold grabs her, but the raggedy man intercedes, letting her slip back inside. Arnold stabs the stranger, then prepares to break down Nita's door, but with his final breath, the raggedy man slashes him with a hand sickle. After moments of silence, Nita goes outside and finds both Arnold and the raggedy man lying dead on the porch. Looking closer at the disfigured face of the raggedy man, she realizes he is her long-lost, unfaithful husband, Harry Longley. The next morning, with the sheriff's blessings, Nita and her sons board a bus to San Antonio. Harry is happy that their father returned to save them. They all agree they want to see Teddy again.

It is about October of 1947. Thirteen year old Loretta Webb and her younger brother Herman are riding on a mule and sled down to the mining camp in Van Lear, Kentucky to pick up the yearly gifts at the company store. Her father, Ted Webb, a hardworking coal miner, tells them they're "giving the company their money back". A young man in a soldier uniform newly discharged from the Army is placing bets on driving his jeep up a heap of coal slag. His name is Doolittle Lynn. He and Loretta exchange brief glimpses and flirts with each other. Doolittle wins the bet and gets his jeep to the top. Ted and his family arrive home with the gifts and we get a glimpse of mountain life with this poor, but decent and happy family of nine living in a log cabin in near abject poverty. All the kids receive new shoes, but Loretta gets an extra gift of a nice dress with her father declaring she's about to become a woman and should have nice things. Meanwhile, Doolittle is visiting with his old friend and moonshiner, Lee Dollarhide, who is trying to convince him to come into business with him, but Doo is reluctant, even though there are no other choices for him except to work in the coal mines or move away. A short time later, Lee Dollarhide is shot to death attempting to steal moonshine from another distributor. The Webb family witness Doolittle, his father, and an undertaker taking Lee's body A seemingly morose Doolittle is now working in the mines shoveling coal and working in a horrible environment of dust, claustrophobia, and danger of it caving in. At the local one room schoolhouse, there is a musical chairs dance and pie auction. Doolittle attends, volunteers to auction the pies, and buys Loretta's last one for $5, more than a days wages for a coal miner back then. He and Loretta sit down together, he tries a slice of the pie, and it turns out she put salt instead of sugar in it. He and Loretta leave early, walk through the woods to her house, see a glimpse of the mine in town, and exchange their likeness for each other. Doolittle declares he wants to get out of the community and how the war changed him for the better on how he can live a more fulfilling life. Loretta doesn't seem to understand, with her very limited view of the world and probably never having been more than a few hours away from her home in her lifetime. Doolittle kisses her goodnight and says he will bring his jeep the next day to pick her up The next day, Doolittle brings his jeep up to the Webb household and Loretta gets in and rides with him, without her mother's consent. Doolittle speeds through creeks, hills, and downtown Paintsville, then they stop, kiss, and have an intimate embrace for the first time. After hours of being gone, her father whips her with a tree branch or a "switch" in front of the family and her mother tells her to stay away from Doolittle or she'll give her an even worse punishment. Sometime later, near Christmastime while pickaxing coal for heating at a shallow mine, Loretta's father Ted pleads with her to stop seeing Doolittle and that she's too young to be associating with a grown man and does not need to throw away her young years In January 1948, soon after Christmas and New Years, Loretta is sitting in the family room on a Saturday night depressed and lovesick. Her father tries to lighten things up with the Grand Ole Opry on their radio with Bill Monroe's "Blue Moon of Kentucky" playing. Doolittle enters the house and immediately the family leaves the room so Loretta and Doolittle can be alone. Doolittle proposes to her and asks permission from her parents, but both of them won't answer and tell him to ask the other parent. Doolittle explains to them while they're in bed that night he wants to marry their daughter, despite her age, and that he'll do whatever it takes and break his back to make her happy. Ted tells him to never hit her or take her far away from home and Doolittle promises. The next day, in an almost empty church, Loretta and Doolittle exchange vows with her father attending very briefly and giving her away. There are no wedding rings exchanged. Loretta and Doolittle spend their honeymoon at a roadside motel somewhere near town. She's supposedly cold and standing near the radiator in her room, but in actuality is scared half to death of the approaching intimacy and sex she knows nothing about. Doolittle forces himself on her, tears off her nightgown, and she cries and pleads with him to stop. The next morning, Doolittle brings her breakfast in bed (probably her first time eating restaurant food) and even though the food is cold, she refuses to go into the restaurant and embarrassed that people will know what they've done. Doolittle slaps her in the face for her outburst, already having broken one promise, he angrily apologizes, then she throws the food on him. Sometime later, Doolittle pulls his jeep up into the company home in town they live in. Loretta tries to be the nice devoted wife and ask about getting a radio, but Doolittle gives her a book called "Sex For Newlyweds" to read. She's offended by the pictures in it, but also a functional illiterate and can't read many of the words. Doolittle is frustrated by her bad cooking, lack of housekeeping, and reluctance to want sex and intimacy with him. He throws her out of the house. Loretta goes back to her parents cabin in Butcher Holler on a rainy/snowy day and her family is all happy to have her back. Her dad notices her weight gain and her mother is worried she's already pregnant. Loretta goes to Doc Turner's office in Paintsville and it turns out she is pregnant. Doolittle just happens to be in town and flirting with a local girl, but Loretta calls her a sow chases her away. Doolittle announces he's leaving Kentucky telling her how the coal mines will kill him young if he doesn't get out soon and that she can come up and join him as soon as he gets the money. This is the second promise broken. Loretta announces she's going to have a baby. Around April of 1948, Loretta and her father bid their farewells at the Van Lear train station with Ted declaring he'll see her again, but "never see his little girl again". It's about January 1959 (should be about 1956, due to the age of the kids) The Lynn family is living in a run-down, but comfortable home in rural Washington with her children Betty Sue, Jack Benny, Ernest Ray, and Cissy, all of them between 4 and 8 years old. Loretta is now a mature woman keeping house and competent cook, making up jars of apple butter and managing her kids. Doolittle is working as a logger. The family all sits down to dinner and they discuss their day. Their neighbor tells them Loretta's mother wishes them happy anniversary (supposedly their 11th one) and wants them to get a telephone, but Doolittle refuses and says he "don't like telephones". Loretta sings "The Great Titanic" to her kids to sleep. She asks Doolittle for a wedding rings as an anniversary gift, but Doolittle says "bullshit", then her son Jack Benny says the same word Doolittle drives to the local pawn shop that morning looking at rings, but ends up getting Loretta a guitar. Loretta is offended that he would buy her something she does not know how to play. But she learns how and sings to her kids while on the porch or doing household chores After a few days of learning the guitar, she and Doolittle drive out to Grange Hall in Custer. She feels he is up to something and it turns out Doolittle wants her to audition to sing on stage the next Saturday. Loretta is scared half to death of doing such a thing, but Doolittle won't take no for an answer. The next Saturday, Loretta sings Patsy Cline's "There He Goes" and ends up loving what she did on stage and does another one. The Lynn family drives to a recording studio in Bellingham and Loretta records a song she's written called "Honky Tonk Girl". After a few flubs, she has now cut her first record. Doolittle takes a picture of Loretta in their home using a bedspread as a backdrop and an aluminum pot top as a flash. Then Doolittle stays up all night typing letters and sending copies of her records to recording studios. The next morning, on February 22, 1959, Loretta is cooking breakfast for her kids. She hears her name being called outside and thinks her father is approaching, but in actuality, it's her neighbor informing them of a family emergency. Her father has just died. The family drives all the way back to Kentucky for the wake at the family home. Doolittle and several other men are outside the cabin drinking moonshine and standing around a burning barrel. At her father's burial, Loretta declares to Doolittle she wants to be a singer. They begin their months long tour all over the south visiting the disk jockeys of the places Doolittle sent records to. The first station they visit is from a dj claiming he played her record and liked it, but she found it in the pile and reprimanded him for lying. After months on the road of sleeping in their car and subsisting on bologna sandwiches, crackers, and Cokes, they meet with record promoter, Hugh Cherry. Loretta says the word "horny" on the radio and did not know that was considered dirty and the manager declares he will never play another record of hers. However, Hugh finds out just now she is #14 on the country charts and it will be played. Loretta and Doolittle travel all night, pull over to the side of the road, and make out. The next morning, she wakes up with their car parked in front of the Grand Ole Opry and excited. Sometime in 1960, Loretta plays on The Grand Ole Opry for the first time. She is introduced by country singer Ernest Tubb (as himself). Country legends Roy Acuff and Minnie Pearl are also on stage greeting her. She feels out of place and that she has not done enough to earn the spot, but does perform. Her husband Doolittle hangs out at a bar with a patron teasing him that he doesn't do or need to do anything and she'll be bringing home all the money now. Doolittle punches him. Loretta leaves that night About September of 1961, Loretta is at the Ernest Tubb music shop singing Patsy Cline's "I Fall to Pieces" as a tribute to her. By this time, Loretta has spent the last year making repeated appearances on the Grand Ole Opry. She receives word from Patsy's husband, Charlie Dick, that Patsy wants to meet her. Patsy has been in the hospital recovering from a near fatal car accident. Loretta at first is intimidated by Patsy's outspoken and brassy personality, but the two become friends almost immediately. For the next several months or so, Loretta and Patsy make tours together on the Grand Ole Opry, at county fairs, and the like. Doolittle is becoming increasingly annoyed with Loretta's more independent nature, fast success, and influence from Patsy, especially trying on makeup for the first time. Loretta catches Doolittle drunk and making out with another woman in a car when their tour bus is about to leave. One day, Loretta and Patsy are out shopping in downtown Nashville, with Doolittle and Charlie dozing in the car while waiting. Doolittle has had enough and demands Loretta remove her makeup and she sasses him again. Doolittle slaps her for it and she breaks his fingers with her purse and they drive away. That night, Loretta is at their home suffering a migraine headache. Doolittle comes home and tells her he needs to get back out and work and do something he's good at, but Loretta assures him that it's because of him that she got where she's at. And he also declares to her there is a price to pay when you get there. Doolittle surprises Loretta with a wedding band she has for the first time after 14 years of marriage. Doolittle gets a job as an auto mechanic. In early March of 1963, Loretta announces to Patsy she's pregnant again and doesn't want to have the child (this was another timeline error, as the twin girls, Peggy and Patsy, were born August 6, 1964, almost a year and a half after Patsy's death). Patsy shows Loretta a box of maternity dresses and Loretta soon leaves. Patsy promises to call her first thing Monday morning after returning home from a benefit concert in Kansas City. On the morning of March 5, 1963, Loretta Lynn and Doolittle are in bed listening to Patsy Cline's "Sweet Dreams" and the disk jockey announces Patsy was killed in a plane crash earlier. Loretta breaks down with Doolittle comforting her and she feels she has nobody to talk to now. Loretta has her twin girls, Peggy and Patsy, but doesn't know which one is which. Over the next 5 years, Loretta is making endless concert tours throughout the country staying in her bus and nights in hotels. Also during this time, she and Doolittle have bought a ranch in Tennessee called Hurricane Mills with Doolittle as caretaker of ranch and raising the twin girls. At her last concert tour, a fan tries to rip her hair out. She is traveling on the bus that night exhausted, unable to sleep, and suffering a migraine. Loretta comes home sometime in 1969 for some rest and relaxation after months on the road. Doolittle points to a car their son Jack Benny wrecked (an error, it was a 1971 or 1972 Ford) She asks Doolittle to start accompanying her to her concerts to be her guardian and caretaker. He reluctantly agrees. Just as they are going to sleep, a phone call is made to their house from a lonely fan wanting to talk to Loretta and Doolittle says she is not home yet, but to quit crying and that he'll give Loretta the message. Loretta and Doolittle are touring together once again, but she's on the edge of burnout, due to her unable to memorize the words of Shel Silverstein's "One's on the Way". At another appearance, Loretta has woke up with her tour bus parked. She has not yet learned the words of the song. She pleads with Doolittle that she can't do the concert, but he feels she should just go out and perform. She comes onstage, but instead of singing, opens up her personal life on stage about how her concert appearances, fame, and all have been overwhelming and exhausting for her, but that she appreciates her fans caring about her. She collapses and has a nervous breakdown and Doolittle carries her out. Months pass by and Loretta spends her life resting away at the ranch. Doolittle takes Loretta out not too far from the ranch one morning and shows her a little house he wants to build. They have an argument about where the window should go and Loretta doesn't like the way he kept the house a secret from her. But they make up After about a year of recovery, and in 1970, Loretta is back on stage once again and sings her signature hit "Coal Miner's Daughter". Coal Miner's Daughter opens with Loretta Webb (Sissy Spacek) riding a mule to the coal mine to meet her Daddy when he completes his shift. As the opening credits continue, the film shows some coal miners deep in a Kentucky coal mine where one yells "fire in the hole," which is followed by an explosion. Then the film switches to Doolittle Lynn (Tommy Lee Jones), who is dressed in his Army uniform, driving a jeep with a blonde girl sitting next to him. Doolittle talks to several of the miners in front of the company store bragging about his beat-up jeep. He cons them into betting he can't climb a heap of red dog (a hill of mining trash) in his jeep. Ted Webb (Levon Helm), Loretty, as he calls her, and Herman, a younger brother, enter the company store where Ted asks the storekeeper if his Sears Roebuck order has arrived. While the storekeeper fetches Ted's order, Doolittle coaxes his jeep up the trash heap and wins the bet. When the Webbs return home to their rundown cabin in Butcher Holler, we meet Loretta's mother, Clary (Phyllis Boyens), and the rest of the Webb brood: eight children who range in age from infancy to age thirteen. Meanwhile Doolittle hikes up the mountain to see his moonshine making friend, Lee Dollarhide (William Sanderson). Doo, as Lee calls him, had worked for Lee selling moonshine to the miners before he went into the Army. Lee admits to the rumors that he steals from the moonshiners over at Greasy Creek when his own supply runs low. He offers to go fifty-fifty if Doo will help him with his moonshine business. Lee reminds his friend that men born in the mountains of eastern Kentucky have three choices: "coal mine, moonshine or movin' on down the line." Back at the Webb cabin, Daddy Webb presents the children with the shoes he had ordered from Sears Roebuck (in the summer they went barefooted, but in the winter they get shoes). On this occasion Loretta receives a dress in addition to shoes; she gets something extra, Ted explains, because she's gettin to be a woman. The first time in the film that Loretta sings she takes her youngest sibling out onto the porch and sings the traditional mountain song, "In the Pines," a cappella. While she's out there, Lee starts another run on Greasy Creek and is shot by one of his moonshine competitors. Soon Doo and his Pa lead Lee's mule with his body draped over it past the Webb home. Doo's Pa is glad his son wasn't working for Lee or he would likely be draped over the mule beside his friend. The scene changes to a community gathering where several of the youngsters are playing musical chairs while a string band plays. After the game there is a pie auction, for which Doo volunteers to be the auctioneer. When it comes time to auction Loretta's chocolate pie, Doo and another young man compete to be the highest bidder. Doo finally wins for $5. While the crowd square dances, Doo tries a bite of Loretta's pie and immediately spits it out. She had put salt instead of sugar in her pie by mistake. Later, he offers her a ride in his jeep, but she won't accept. So, he walks her home. During the walk Doo talks about how much he learned about the outside world while he was in the Army. It made him realize he doesn't want to be a coal miner. When they get to her cabin, he kisses her good night (it was her first kiss). As he's leaving he promises to bring his jeep up to her cabin and take her for a ride, but she doesn't think he can get it up the holler. The next morning, true to his word, Doo drives his jeep up the holler to take Loretta for a ride - a wild ride. When Doo almost plunges the jeep off an embankment, he kisses Loretta. She is breathless partly from the kiss, but also from the wild ride. Doo tells her, "That's the way youre supposed to feel when youre in love." When she returns home after dark, her Daddy whips her like she was a little girl and tells her to stay away from Doo. Later, when Loretta and her father go to a shallow mine for coal for the family to burn, he talks to her about her relationship with Doo; she's not even fourteen and he's a wild grown-up. He begs his "shinin' pride" not to throw her young years away, but she loves Doo and they want to get married. Back at the cabin while the family is listening to the Grand Ole Opry on their battery-powered radio, Ted encourages his wife, Clary, to do her squaw dance. Ted sings along with Bill Monroe's "Blue Moon of Kentucky" while Clary dances. While everybody is watching and listening, Doo knocks on the door, but they don't hear him, so he comes in anyway. Once they realize he's in the cabin, Clary stops dancing and goes into another room and Ted turns off the radio and leaves the cabin. Once Loretta and Doo are alone, he shows her the money he had saved from his Army paychecks. He reminds her that the next day is their anniversary (he doesn't say anniversary of what), so he thinks it would be good time to get married. Loretta likes the idea, but tells him to ask her Daddy, who tells him to ask Clary, who tells him to ask Ted - back and forth. Finally, Doo waits until they are in bed and goes into their bedroom to ask them both at the same time. Ted asks him to promise two things: don't hit her and don't take her far away from home. Doo promises. The next day at their wedding there are two ladies sitting in the pews of the rustic church. Ted finally walks in the back door, stands there long enough to answer "I do" when the preacher asks who gives this woman to be married to this man, and then leaves. They don't have wedding rings to exchange. At the motel on their wedding night, it is freezing. Loretta puts her night gown on over her other clothes, partly because she's so cold but also because she's afraid of sex. Doo forces himself on her, which frightens and disgusts her. The next morning she won't go into the adjoining restaurant because she's sure people will stare and know what they've been doing. Doo tells her she better get used to it. When she says, "I ain't gonna get used to you gettin' on me and sweatin' like an ol' pig," Doo breaks one of the promises he had made her Daddy; he slaps her. Doo goes to work at the coal mine while Loretta tries to learn how to be a house wife. Doo loses his patience with her lousy cooking, her lack of house cleaning and her innocence about how to love her man, so he gives her a book, "Sex for Newlyweds." In the following scene, Loretta trudges up the holler towards her folks' cabin; Doo has thrown her out. When her Daddy says, "I believe married life's makin' you fat, girl," her mother immediately realizes her daughter is pregnant. Loretta goes to the doctor and sure enough, before her fourteenth birthday, she is pregnant. When she leaves the doctor's office, she sees a girl flirting with Doo so she picks up a stick and runs her off. Doo tells Loretta he's leaving Kentucky. He's going to Washington (state) to find a job; he refuses to be buried alive in the coal mine. He plans to send for her as soon as he saves enough money. She reminds him of his promise not to take her far away from home. Well, he says, she'll just have to choose which is more important: being her Daddy's daughter or his wife. He gives her a ride home and on the way she tells him she's going to have a baby. He laughs and says, "You know, you might have found something that you know how to do." Months later Loretta receives a letter from Doo with enough money for the trip to Washington. The film skips ahead to Loretta's life in Washington. She's now the seventeen-year-old mother of four. Doo, who is now known as "Mooney" because of his moonshine days back in Kentucky, works as a logger. One night Loretta sings the children to sleep with a song about the sinking of the Titanic. Mooney listens intently. Afterwards, he asks what she'd like for her anniversary present. She reminds him she still doesnt have a wedding ring. Mooney goes to the local pawn shop to look for an anniversary present. He comes home late that evening drunk with a guitar for her gift. Even though she can't play it, he bought her a guitar because he likes the way she sings. While she sits on the front porch washing clothes in a decrepit washing machine, she picks out the chords and sings "Have I Told You Lately That I Love You?" As she improves, she makes her kids sit and listen and also sings while Mooney washes the supper dishes. Mooney suggests they get a babysitter and go honky-tonkin'. On Saturday night they go to the local Grange Hall. Mooney seems to have something on his mind and Loretta thinks he must be going to finally give her a ring. Instead, Mooney talks to the bandleader about auditioning Loretta to sing with his band. When she realizes what her husband is doing, she runs to the bathroom. He follows and finally talks her into the audition. The next week Loretta is introduced as the new girl singer of the Westerneers. At first, she sings "There He Goes," a song popularized by Patsy Cline, very timidly, but quickly loses her inhibitions and performs the song so well that the audience applauds lustily. While she is gardening one day, she makes up her first original song, "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl." Mooney wants Loretta to cut a record, so they go to a small local recording studio. After she flubs a take, Mooney places the kids in the studio so she can sing to them like she does at home. After a few bars, the recording engineer stops the session to get more and better pickers because "that little lady sings her hind end off." Back home, Mooney takes a publicity photo with their bedspread as the backdrop. After work, he stays up all night addressing envelopes with Loretta's photo and her record to country DJs. Mooney and Loretta don't have a telephone, so a neighbor comes to tell Loretta she has a long distance emergency phone call - her Daddy has died. Back in Kentucky for the funeral, friends and family sing "Amazing Grace" at the wake. It took Loretta quite a while to recover from her Daddy's death. Mooney finally convinces her if she wants to be a singer they have to see DJs in person to make certain they play her record. Grandma keeps the kids while they travel from station to station in eastern Kentucky. One of them claims to have received her record, played it and it flopped, but they find the envelope they sent unopened. She rants so vociferously, the DJ relents and plays it. On an interview segment a DJ tells her she has to pay her dues before she can sing on the Opry. Despite all the obstacles, "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl" becomes a hit. After an all-night drive, Loretta wakes to find they're parked in front of the Ryman Auditorium, the home of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. She's in awe. On her first appearance on the Opry, Ernest Tubb (himself) opens the show by singing "Walkin' the Floor Over You." Loretta is scared; she doesn't think she belongs on such a prestigious stage; she hasn't suffered enough to be this far this fast. (The film shows a glimpse of two country music legends, Minnie Pearl and Roy Acuff, in the wings of the theater.) Tubb introduces Loretta who sings "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl." After her performance, Tubb invites her to return the following week. After Loretta appeared on the Opry seventeen straight weeks, she sings "I Fall to Pieces" at Ernest Tubb's Record Shop in downtown Nashville. During an instrumental break, she dedicates the song to Patsy Cline, who made it a hit. She tells the listening audience that Patsy is in the hospital recovering from a car wreck. Afterward, Charlie Dick (Bob Hannah), Patsy's husband, meets them outside and tells Loretta that Patsy (Beverly DAngelo) would like to meet her. Loretta accompanies Charlie to the hospital and she and Patsy become bosom buddies. When Patsy returns to the Opry, she sings "Sweet Dreams" while Loretta watches from the wings. Later on Patsy's tour bus on the way to an appearance at a fair, Patsy sings a little of Kitty Wells' hit "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels." In the pouring rain, Patsy and Loretta sing a duet of "Back in Baby's Arms" while each holds an umbrella. After the show Loretta catches Mooney in the back seat of a car with a carnival floozie. She drags him out and threatens that she better never catch him with trash like that again. Later, on the bus she writes the song "You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)" about that incident. After a shopping trip with Patsy, Mooney and Loretta fight over her use of makeup (he doesn't like it and never has). Loretta hits his hand with her purse and then drives away with Charlie and Patsy. When Mooney comes home late, his hand is all bandaged. He's decided to get a job (he feels like a kept man and that was a serious male ego problem in the country community if not in the nation at large). She offers to quit if her being the bread winner is going to cause them to split. During their conversation, he finally gives her a wedding ring. Mooney gets a job as a mechanic in a garage where we hear Loretta sing "You Ain't Woman Enough" over the radio. Loretta visits Patsy and tells her she's pregnant again, but she doesn't want this baby. Patsy cheers her up by promising to give her the biggest baby shower in Nashville. Then Patsy gives her a box of her old maternity clothes. Patsy is leaving for a benefit performance in Kansas City, but she promises to call when she returns on Monday and they'll go shopping. Loretta wakes on Monday morning to the sounds of Patsy's voice singing "Sweet Dreams" on the radio. The announcer speaks over her singing and says, "You're listening to a tribute to the late Patsy Cline, tragically killed early this morning in a plane crash near Dyersburg, Tennessee." In the next scene, Loretta has given birth to twin girls that she names Peggy and Patsy (of course, Patsy is named after Patsy Cline). Back on stage at the Opry, Loretta sings "You're Lookin' at Country." As the song continues, she tours, writes songs on her tour bus, and signs autographs. The Opry announcer introduces her as having twenty-one No. 1 records. While she sings "Sweet Dreams," Mooney drives his jeep up to their mansion in Hurricane Hills, Tennessee and later bathes the twins. While she sings "You Ain't Woman Enough" we see her touring again and spending lonely nights in hotel rooms. When the Opry announcer introduces her as the first lady of country music, she sings "Your Squaw Is on the Warpath," while Mooney and the twins watch on TV. Her relentless schedule finally catches up with her. She's having throbbing headaches and medicine doesn't help. She wants Mooney on the road with her to take care of her. Out on the road again, Loretta sings "Lovin' Country Style." Later, she can't remember the lyrics to a new song, "One's on the Way," so one of her band members feeds the lyrics to her, but they soon give up and switch to the more familiar "You Ain't Woman Enough." At her next concert, she doesn't want to go on, but Doo convinces her not to let her fans down. When she goes on stage, she doesn't come in after the band plays the introduction for her first song. Instead, she talks to the audience - her friends and fans and tells them that Patsy told her, "you got to run your own life," but she feels like her life is running her. As she walks off the stage she collapses into her husband's arms (she suffered a nervous breakdown brought on by physical exhaustion and marital stress - her marriage miraculously survived). After her recuperation back at their ranch, she returns to the Opry and sings "Coal Miner's Daughter," which is her very autobiographical song. That song segues into the closing credits which recaps scenes from the film. Further into the closing credits, we hear excerpts from "One's on the Way," "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl," "You Ain't Woman Enough," "You're Lookin' at Country," "Fist City," "Your Squaw Is On the Warpath," and "Don't Come Home A-Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)."