Just so...so bad

Crappy film

If you're interested in the topic at hand, you should just watch it and judge yourself because the reviews have gone very biased by people that didn't even watch it and just hate (or love) the creator. I liked it, it was well written, narrated, and directed and it was about a topic that interests me.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

The movie is so-so, kinda interesting and kinda boring at the same time. mediocre film. A little bit funny at times and not enough music.Our story focuses on Elliot Teichberg who accidentally kicks off the one of the most memorable times in history: The Woodstock Festival of 1969. The problem with the film is our lead character Elliot. He's rather boring and uninteresting. He's just there, blazay and not much of a personality and the film focuses on him and not so much the festival itself - I think this is the big disappointment with the film.Woodstock was about the music and the message of peace and love. I think most fans of Woodstock are grateful to Max Yasgur for the use of his dairy farm for that wonderful event - but the film shows us a rather boring Elliot for the most part and misses the whole point.The movie is not completely awful - but it's not that good. It's in the middle ground.5/10

Sometimes I feel like a motherless child. First impressions, on my second hand blu-ray cover the title grabbed my attention but did not make me want to buy. The picture reminded me of the Australian satire Strictly Ballroom (1992) and that did make me want to buy. In the UK, the 1960's was a time when satire became a major 'modern' comedy form. Strictly Ballroom as a more recent Australian example that I could rate as warm fun. If one did not experience the 1960's personally then a lot of what I understand to be the power of Taking Woodstock might be lost, not that it will be empty, just the richness of the detail would not be noticed so much. The portrayal of the lookalike to Abbie Hoffman as just one of the scrumptious cultural elements that might pass over those who never browsed Oz or it or the Rolling Stone of that time. That portrayal is mostly right but sometimes iffy, not warm, and re-watching Woodstock proper shows me that the actual guy who organised the event also looked like that. I was seeing parallels that maybe do not exist. When the music documentary feature Woodstock (1970) appeared locally, it did not click too much with me, I was walking dead, but watching it on DVD some of the interviews did seem worthwhile. Re-watching it, some of the music as well. Satire. This particular adaptation of the Woodstock legend does not take things seriously, everything is up for grabs by the satire machine, but I would guess that many from that time might accept it as fun humour. Much UK 1960's satire was really biting the ankles of the old world and some seem to experience this particular story as biting the ankles of Woodstock Nation, which is now old world. I personally consider that this is an example of such satire being capable of having gentleness and taste. Some consider it as an attack against sacred cows, I consider it to be in keeping with some relevant comedy of those times, comedy often centred on sacred cows. The ethics of comedy as a difficult area. iCarly, otherwise unusually excellent modern USA children's television, does occasionally include satire re tramps and other lost ones. To me that is psycho. A 1980's UK television sitcom included satire re the unemployed and to me that really totally felt sick. In both cases it is humour that laughs at those crippled by modern ideas of good, having a laugh at the expense of the victim classes. Very modern. Yet I can accept Taking Woodstock as an example of okay satire. Later episodes of iCarly are often okay as well. Taking Woodstock gently does a take on a legend of gentle sacred cows who do not believe in the sacrifice of cows. A field full of us. * So that felt true after watching it a couple of times. Re-watch it a third time after drafting the above and I am maybe overdoing the praise a lot, but for me the first impression was good. I just need to not re-watch this all that often. The satire in the characterisation of the parents. I would have put it slightly differently, old time religion linking to the politics, except that is there too. For me, the late sixties was a spiritual effect rather than spiritual. The early sixties as spiritual, if one could but comprehend as it seemed more a reaction against spiritual. The mid sixties as old world values waving a flag. Sometimes I feel like a motherless child.

It's seems remarkable to me that such a massive historic event as the one portrayed in Ang Lee's Taking Woodstock has largely been ignored in the movies, when it included many giants of the industry and took place in one of the most beloved era's in our recent history. The event I'm referring to is, of course, the legendary Woodstock Festival in 1969. The Festival was documented in the epic 1970 documentary Woodstock, but Lee's film concentrates on the creation of the Festival, the resistance the creators were faced with by the townspeople, and the dedication that the protagonist Elliot Teichberg had in what he saw as putting money into his poor parents pockets and back into the town's economy.Teichberg (played with ease by stand-up comic Demetri Martin) is a successful interior designer and President of the Chamber of Commerce who spends most of his time handing his parents money so they can keep running their s**t-hole motel, in which his miser mother tries to saves money by turning the bed sheets over rather than actually washing them. His long-suffering father spends his days in a semi-daze after years of living with his Russian-born wife who accuses anyone in her path of being an anti-Semite and reminds them of her struggle escaping from the Nazi's during WWII.When Teichberg overhears that the original location to hold the Festival falls through due to opposition from the town members, he uses his permit (purchased for $1 for his usual small arts festival for the theatre troupe that lives in his barn) to lure the organisers to Woodstock and obtains permission to have free reign to use the acres of land owned by dairy-farmer Max Lasgur (the ever-brilliant Eugene Levy). He is aided by festival organiser Michael Lang (Jonathan Groff) and transvestite Vilma, who, being played by giant Liev Schreiber, looks ridiculous in a blond wig, but played to fantastic comic effect.There are both strengths and weaknesses for the film, unfortunately a lot more of the latter. The film beautifully captures the era without going overboard, and it wisely keeps the focus on the main character's plight to make the concert work rather than shifting to the concert itself. But, while the character of Teichberg is interesting himself, his relationship with his mother and father takes up most of the film's focus, and it just isn't either convincing or interesting enough. His mother is uptight and unappreciative of her son's input in the family business, spending years saving any money she can while her son goes broke and the business suffers. It's a storyline that's been covered many times before and offers nothing new, although played well by the ever-reliable Imelda Staunton. Thank God, then, for the sweet relationship that develops between father Jake (Henry Goodman) and Schreiber's character, with the former fully engaging with the swarm of hippies on their motel and finding a new dimension and meaning to his life.I must admit I was expecting more from a director of the magnitude of Ang Lee, capturing the same kind of magic found in Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous, but it's never quite funny, dramatic or engaging enough. Many scenes fall flat, such as a spectacularly unfunny scene where Teichberg's parents eat 'special' brownies given to them by Vilma and proceed to dance and laugh with their son before stumbling into their bedroom and falling asleep. And the inclusion of Emile Hirsch's character - an isolated and paranoid Vietnam veteran who is struggling to fit back into home life - is just poorly written and wholly unconvincing.Maybe I'm being a bit too harsh, or maybe I just expect more from Ang Lee. It is elevated by good performances by Martin and Schreiber. It also has a few nice moments - namely when we experience a screaming crowd turn into waves of psychedelic lights through the eyes of an acid- influenced Teichberg. An easy film to watch, but disappointingly run-of- the-mill.www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

vIdea: a movie about Woodstock not about the music of the Festival & but instead concentrates on one guy who held the musical festival & fair permit to allow Woodstock to happen in small town in upstate NY. In 1969 a music festival named Woodstock has its roots in the entrepreneurship of Eliot Tiber (Demetri Martin); He is a interior decorator from Greenwich Village. His parents Sonia Teichberg (Imedla Staunton) & Jake Teichberg (Henry Goodman) own a cheesy motel in the Catskills that is about to go out of business when Eliot steps in with his inspiration. He calls in the promoter of the concert Michael Lang (Jonathan Groff) & introduces him to Max Yasgur (Eugene Levy) whose large pastoral farmlands could be a perfect location for the music festival. In the meantime Eliot keeps his personal life private, but yearns to join the music festival crowd to unleash his true self. In the meantime, the festival turns into a happening when several hundred thousand budding hippies show up. There are several plots here all interesting & funny. Martin is in what should be his breakout role to fame. (He is already a good comedian.) This movie does not focus at all on any of the music or performers. In fact it is almost a comedic assault on a lot of people the local town people & the people who show up for Woodstock including freaks transsexuals cross dressers Jews performance artists & actors. It is very charming & hysterically funny! The parents are both especially funny. In 1968 being out & gay was a very big deal-that does not play like that here. Film is a sweet comedy of transformation in which the changes in Elliot mirror a cultural revolution. (Did Woodstock Change the World??) Too bad they could not have included the actual Woodstock footage. I guess copyright holders would not allow it. I have liked most of Ang Lees movies-he is a truly great film makers. (Lust & Caution was a bore to me) I like this movie a lot it is a fascinating & very funny fictional account of the behind the scenes of what became Woodstock. Ang Lee is not afraid of fresh challenges!!! This film is not as great as some of his other movies but it really is a good movie. 4 Stars!!