Woodstock

    Woodstock
    1970

    Synopsis

    An intimate look at the Woodstock Music & Art Festival held in Bethel, NY in 1969, from preparation through cleanup, with historic access to insiders, blistering concert footage, and portraits of the concertgoers; negative and positive aspects are shown, from drug use by performers to naked fans sliding in the mud, from the collapse of the fences by the unexpected hordes to the surreal arrival of National Guard helicopters with food and medical assistance for the impromptu city of 500,000.

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    Cast

    • Richie HavensSelf
    • Joan BaezSelf
    • Roger DaltreySelf - The Who
    • John EntwistleSelf - The Who
    • Keith MoonSelf - The Who
    • Pete TownshendSelf - The Who
    • Joe CockerSelf
    • Country Joe McDonaldSelf - Country Joe and the Fish
    • Barry MeltonSelf - Country Joe and the Fish
    • Greg DeweySelf - Country Joe and the Fish

    Recommendations

    • 100

      Chicago Sun-Times

      The remarkable thing about Wadleigh's film is that it succeeds so completely in making us feel how it must have been to be there. [2005]
    • 100

      Vox

      Terrific concert documentary...The film that resulted — a roughly though not strictly chronological document of the much-publicized event — is an outstanding documentary, a joyful musical experience and a playful artifact of an era. [2019]
    • 100

      Entertainment Weekly

      Describing Woodstock as a concert movie is a little like calling Notre Dame a house of worship. In its scope and grandeur, its feel for the paradoxical nature of an event in which half a million middle-class bohemians created their own scruffy, surging community — a metropolis of mud — Woodstock remains the one true rock-concert spectacle, a counterculture Triumph of the Will. [1994]
    • 100

      San Francisco Chronicle

      What's amazing is the raw honesty of it all -- the performances, the interviews, the spontaneous occurrences. There is little artifice. The 70mm print is must-view material for rock fans and sociologists of any age or generation. [1994 version]
    • 91

      The A.V. Club

      Wadleigh crafted a film with a thoughtful flow; it tells the full story of the event, from the paranoia (and eventual acceptance) of the locals to the helpful attitudes (and eventual paranoia) of the throng. [1994 version]
    • 90

      Washington Post

      Woodstock captures the spirit of itself quite well, and much of what we take for granted now in music videos and stage performance was shaped not only by the festival but by Wadleigh's film. [17 Aug 1989, p.C7]
    • 90

      Los Angeles Times

      Now, as ever, "Woodstock" is not just a great slice-of-time documentary but still the ultimate rock concert movie: A quarter-century of advances hasn't brought about any real improvements on the multiple-camera filming techniques or even significantly dated the split-screen effects and varying aspect ratio tricks. The advent of digital sound, on the other hand, has given the remixed soundtrack a theatrical glory unknown a generation ago. At this pristine volume, Jimi Hendrix's concluding bit may not be quite suitable for anyone with a heart condition, which would constitute more of the Woodstock nation than some of us might like to consider. [29 June 1994, p.F6]
    • 80

      Time Out

      A time capsule, yes, and a hallowed memory, perhaps. But gimme shelter.

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