With the death of singer and actor Kris Kristofferson, snatched, at the venerable age of 88, from the affections of music lovers and movie buffs, this September 28, the USA is in mourning. Well, not all; as he embodied a certain America: that of the past.
Thus, the one who could be described as a conservative hippie was born on June 22, 1936, in Brownsville, Texas. Son of a US Air Force general, he began by following in his father’s footsteps by joining the army as a helicopter pilot, while starting to skim, guitar in hand, the German clubs and dens, where he is barracked.
In 1965, he had to choose: teach the art of war at West Point, the prestigious military university that we know, or become a country singer, the blues of white people. The army loses what art gains, because it is the second path that it chooses, without ever denying anything of its past.
Apart from his angelic face and his athletic build, Kris Kristofferson quickly reveals himself to be an outstanding composer. One of his first songs? Me and Bobby McGeequite simply. A hit which is not quite one when he performs it, but which will become the first (and last) number one in the charts, when transcended by Janis Joplin. She will never know this, having died on October 4, 1970, a few days after recording what would soon become an American standard, like Hymn to love by Edith Piaf, at home.
Close to Sam Peckinpah – a filmmaker who we can describe, without taking any great risk of being wrong, ” right-wing anarchist » -, Kris Kristofferson becomes an actor early. Of his Hollywood career, the media obviously celebrated A star is bornby Frank Pierson (1976), where he shared the bill with the diva Barbra Streisand. But more interesting are his three films shot under the direction of the aforementioned Sam Peckinpah: Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973), Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia (1974) et The Convoy (1978), where he embodies the emblematic figure of the American of before, dismayed by the modernity to come. Indeed, these two men were born to get along, as their personalities, both rebellious and reactionary, made them cherish the America of the pioneers; those where borders did not exist and in which the White House did not yet make the law.
Add to this that the two accomplices were heavy drinkers and marijuana enthusiasts. They both saw themselves as cowboys and, in fact, more or less outlaws. Hence the logical joining of the deceased to the movement outlaw countryintended to de-gentrify a country music that has become too conventional in their eyes.
There, he finds himself in good company: the late Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings, not forgetting Willie Nelson, another legend of the discipline, who has just celebrated his 90th birthday.
Relieving the plight of American farmers
It is therefore just as logically, in the midst of humanitarian hysteria Live Aid (these concerts supposed to come to the aid of Ethiopians in the midst of famine), that certain unclassifiable artists, including the same Willie Nelson, decide to come to the aid of other deprived people, but from home: American farmers. Kris Kristofferson couldn’t help but be one of them. He will be nonchalant, as usual. So it will be the festival Farm Aidwhich lasted for nearly twenty years.
And it is always as a dilettante that he continues his little journey, lining up more than twenty records recorded in the flow, with selected friends, while continuing his career on the big screen. To the consternation of some of his most progressive acquaintances, we see him thus in Vigilante Forceby George Armitage (1975), in our regions renamed Private militiawhose title speaks for itself, and recently reissued on DVD.
Close to another Hollywood dropout, Mel Gibson
We then see it in Payback (1999), one of the best films by another outsider, a certain Mel Gibson. Then it will be the trilogy Bladebrilliantly revisiting the vampire film, in which he appears, under the camera inspired by Guillermo del Toro, as mentor to Wesley Snipes, here half-man, half-creature of the night. A role full of nuances… just like him.
At the dawn of the 2020s, Kris Kristofferson decided to finally retire. He was then 84 years old and never ceased to be a free man, having always behaved as such.
We hope that where he is now, the green meadows are still as beautiful. Because in his genre, here is a man who, standing straight in his boots, will never be unworthy.
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