Day 014 || Taking Woodstock

Taking Woodstock, 2009

Dir. Ang Lee

"Perspective is what keeps the universe out. It's what keeps love out."

Taking Woodstock is the story of Eli (or Elliot, played quite well by comedian Demetri Martin) who moves back home to help his parents with their failing hotel. To get the business flowing again for his parents, and for the livelihood of the his home town, he decides to get Woodstock to use one of the local areas as the primary location of the free-love and music festival. What follows is a young man's journey into finding himself.

The thing that a lot of people take issue with this film over is the lack of music, or the presence of Woodstock. It's here in the film, but it's always at a distance. We deal with the crowds of people and really get to experience the sheer size and mass of it all (which is admittedly one of the best aspects of the film), but never do we see any of the great musical performances. People who complain about such a trivial point, are blindly missing the message of the film. It's a coming of age story where Eli, through the surrounding craze that is Woodstock finds himself, as simultaneously most of the youth of the world were trying to find themselves. It's not about Woodstock as much as it is about Eli.

No, my problems with Taking Woodstock are much more real and valid. The film is a huge build-up to such a small character development. I'm not saying I needed some life-affirming or anything, but the place where Eli comes to at the end of the film is such a small move forward. In much the same way I take issue with biopics or films of that sort, we're largely just getting this man's life, but on film. It's a shame because by going this route directors often forget what power films can have and hold, and the medium just never seems to work with these types of stories. Instead of having thematically relevant and symbolic experiences, we see Eli encountering things by pure happenstance and luck, rather than something that actually means something.

Again, it is disappointing, but the film isn't bad by any means. It's just a largely uninvolving one. I enjoyed watching it, with the exception of some severe tone issues, but I'm not going to talk about it or dig deeper into it, because there's nothing deeper on display here, much like The Adventures of Sebastian Cole (which coincidentally has another great performance by a cross-dressing actor, this time played by Liev Schreiber).

Taking Woodstock didn't affect me one way or the other, and writing about it today I had trouble even remembering most of it. It's an uneven, though well shot, well acted, sometimes enjoyable, and completely forgettable film. One that's ultimately hollow and lacking of any real substance, and that I can't honestly recommend.

2 out of 5