James Wright (River Phoenix) is joined by Miranda Presley (Samantha Mathis) for an impromptu duet in "The Thing Called Love." The Paramount film was directed by Peter Bogdanovich and produced by John Davis. The screenplay was written by Carol Heikkinen. George Folsey, Jr. is the executive producer and Darlene K. Chan is the co-producer.

As country music continues to reach new heights of popularity in the '90s, "The Thing Called Love" cast members and filmmakers have their own perspectives about the trends and evolution of this distinctly American musical style.

River Phoenix sees a reason for country music's growing popularity in its accessibility as "melodic storytelling -- motivated by an inspiring moment in time rather than being part of a production line process," while his co-star Samantha Mathis appraises that it "talks about things we can all relate to . . . love, lost love, and dreams, all sorts of things that are very real issues to everyone today."

"The artists that are coming along now have been raised on all kinds of music and those influences are heard in the work of new songwriters and singers," appraises actress/Grammy-winning recording artist K.T. Oslin. She perceives this as one of many reasons why those of the baby boom generation have switched to country music -- and that "It's hard to relate to the rebelliousness of rock and roll when you're 42 years old, have a mortgage and are sort of getting on with adult life."

Producer John Davis, who grew up with the country sound in Colorado, comments, "It's all about precious emotions and feelings and the day-to-day aspects of our lives. I don't that that the other forms of music are speaking to us right now to the level reached by country."

"It's almost as though country music has taken the place of conventional pop music in certain ways," says Peter Bogdanovich, "because country encompasses so many different sounds today. Pop music has gotten very noisy and rap music isn't very melodic."

The film's song score was conceived by Bogdanovich to naturally emanate from sources within scenes, which is a stylistic trademark of the director. "It gives the picture more reality," Bogdanovich says. "I like music to be counterpoint rather than always underlining what's happening visually."

In the film, these are the songs performed by the film's four lead actors: River Phoenix sings "Standing On A Rock," "Lone Star State of Mine," "Love Is," "Until Now," "Lost Highway," and "Blame It On Your Heart" (solo and duet with Samantha Mathis); Samantha Mathis also sings "Big Bar Hair," "I Can't Understand" and "Big Dream"; Dermot Mulroney sings "I Can't Understand" and "Streets of Love"; and Sandra Bullock sings "Heaven Knocking On My Door."

"The Thing Called Love" soundtrack album is a Giant Records release and consists of a dozen songs that are among the approximately 50 different songs featured in the film. The titles of these 12 songs and the artists performing them on the album are:

"Dreaming With My Eyes Open" -- Clay Walker "You'd Be Home By Now" -- Daron Norwood "I Can't Understand" -- Trisha Yearwood "I Don't Remember Your Name (But I Remember You)" -- K.T. Oslin "Diamonds and Tears" -- Matraca Berg "Ready & Waiting" -- Deborah Allen "Until Now" -- Rodney Crowell "Looking For A Thing Called Love" -- Dennis Robbins "Streets of Love" -- Kevin Welch "Partners In Wine" -- Randy Travis "Blame It On Your Heart" -- Deborah Allen "Standing On A Rock" -- Rodney Crowell

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