A Prairie Home Companion - movie reviews and information

Altman, Keillor prove a winning team with 'A Prairie Home Companion'
by Eleanor Ringel Gillespie

"A Prairie Home Companion" is as heartwarming as a plate of Powdermilk Biscuits, as unexpected as a slice of rhubarb pie and as wistful as a chorus of "Red River Valley." This winning comedy is the work of two master humanists: director Robert Altman and humorist Garrison Keillor, the radio raconteur on whose show the movie is based. It's the (fictional) final performance of Keillor's long-running program, which has been broadcast from the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, Minn., since 1974. Read the full review

TO SUM UP
On a rainy Saturday night in St. Paul, Minnesota, fans file into the Fitzgerald Theater to see "A Prairie Home Companion," a staple of radio station WLT, not knowing that WLT has been sold to a Texas conglomerate and that this show will be the last.

FILM FACTS ...

Picturehouse

'A Prairie Home Companion'

Director: Robert Altman
Starring: Garrison Keillor, Tommy Lee Jones, Kevin Kline, Lily Tomlin, Meryl Streep, Woody Harrelson, Lindsay Lohan
Run time: 105 minutes
Release date: June 9, 2006
Rating: PG-13 for risqué humor.
See showtimes

On the web
Official movie site
View the trailer
Trailers require Quicktime

READ THE REVIEW

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: A-
"Infused with a kind of cosmic nostalgia, the movie does a graceful Tennessee waltz around matters of mortality and acceptance, art and family, hope and reconciliation."

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Austin American-Statesman: 4 of 5 stars
"... as cemented in nostalgia for the show as the show is nostalgic for an earlier age."

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The Palm Beach Post: B+
"The worst that could be said about A Prairie Home Companion is that it is inconsequential. But the movie so compensates by being diverting that the need to add up to something — an expectation that Altman has been avoiding for most of his career — seems beside the point."