Taking Woodstock (2009)

“I came across a child of god he was walking across the road and I stopped to ask him where are you going and he told me.” If you know what he told Joni or if you are old enough to have these lyrics burned into your cerebral cortex than you will love the flashbacks Taking Woodstock evokes. Joni Mitchell and so many other amazing musicians of ‘60s folklore were there, and so were about a million stoned out freaks and fairies. What a three days it was! Waiting to greet the gathering were a few hundred simple folk of the rural upstate New York community. Needless to say, they had no idea that anything could ever make their sleepy home so popular that the New York State Throughway would be closed because of the number of people headed their way. The interaction between the locals and the hippies headed there is depicted with wry humor and warmth by director Ang Lee.

Nostalgia for the uniqueness of the age and the freshness of the music permeates the film. Leonard the 21 year old menschy son of the proprietors of a rundown resort motel attempts to stave off the imminent bankruptcy of his aging immigrant parents. When Leonard hears that a music festival has been banned from a neighboring town he quickly sends an invitation to the producers to come to his sleepy Catskills resort. In short order, a bevy of suited agents and erstwhile rock impresarios pull up in their Lincoln Town cars and strike a deal with Max Yazgar the biggest landowner in the area for the use of his seventy five acres. Leonard realizes the deal is about to transform his world as he is handed thousands of dollars in cash in brown paper bags for the use of his parents’ resort and the construction crews and flower children start pouring in. The locals of the Woodstock area first plot how to profit off of the music festival then watch in horror and amazement as it becomes the iconic cultural event of the rebellious, music-loving era.

As the protagonist of the story Leonard represents the conflicted good son who tries to bridge the generation gap produced by drugs, sex, and Rock and Roll, the Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War. For many families in the America of the 1960s this was a hopelessly lost cause. Leonard is swept up in the momentousness of the event and feels the stirring of his own desire to break away from his home and hang-ups and join in the pleasures of his contemporaries. Wandering into the festival he meets a couple who invite him into their van where he is introduced to LSD. Needless to say the psychedelic experience is transformative. Leonard leaves the festival having heard little of the music but having seen beautiful visions both real and imaginary. For those people who experienced the age as an awakening to the possibilities of freedom this film is a joyous memory. For those who did not, like the couple who sat next to me all they may see is the soggy mess that was left behind, not three days of peace and love, the ideal of a generation.

Taking Woodstock. Directed by Ang Lee, written by James Schamus. Starring Dimitri Martin, Liev Schreiber, Imelda Stauton, Emile Hirsch