A Prairie Home Companion
Robert Altman’s swan song and a fictional film version of a real life mid Western radio show complete with live guests singing ad jingles and singing cowboys with jokes. It is all good fun and a typical Altman choral production. Not too much of a story – the film depicts a fictional last night of the programme and how the various performers cope with it in between the songs and gags. We also have a strange private detective, a mystery angel of death (tough part for Virginia Madsen), the new owner who comes to see the last night and the make up ladies, stage managers, sandwich sellers, etc. Part of it is a nostalgic look back at the past and how it inevitably must die off – the show is like a person in this respect. Garrison Keillor, the real-life presenter of the show is the centre of the film, he sings and MC’s in an affable country style. 
Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep do a fine routine as singing sisters with plenty of comic timing, Woody Harrelson and John C Reilly are risque cowboys 
and Lindsay Lohan, Kevin Kline and others give us their talents. It is a pleasant film about living for the moment, being yourself and honouring the past but being ready to move on. I liked it without raving about it.
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