DVDs in Review

Taking Woodstock

Title: Taking Woodstock (2009)

Release date: March 8 2010

Certificate: 15

Format: Reviewed on DVD, available on Blu-ray

DVD RRP: £19.99

Rating: 3.5/5

'Taking Woodstock' represents the era of groovy rose-tinted glasses and free love, a time in the 1960s when anything seemed possible. Unfortunately for Ang Lee's comedy drama, which charts the genesis of the immortal Woodstock festival, the story is filtered through rose-tinted glasses as well.

'Taking Woodstock' may be overly nostalgic and propelled without any real sense of purpose or timing, but for fans of that music scene or just festivals in general, it's a pleasurable experience brimming with innocence and, yes, free love.

It tells the tale of Elliot Teichberg (Demetri Martin), a New York-based interior designer who finds out that a music festival near his family’s hotel has lost its license.

He figures that bringing the festival back will boost the family hotel's finances, so calls Woodstock Ventures and offers to help them stage the gig which quickly snowballs into something epic.

Throw in some solid, yet kooky, support from Emile Hirsch (who was so brilliant in the lead for Sean Penn's wilderness drama 'Into the Wild', here looking like a grizzled George Harrison) and Liev Schreiber (playing a muscular transvestite in a blonde wig, but instead of going for easy laughs, he plays it completely deadpan) and you've got a film brimming with youth but aimed at people who are over 40-years-old.

It's an eclectic mix from Ang Lee, director of 'Brokeback Mountain' and the shatteringly sexual 'Lust, Caution', who here has crafted a minor, underwhelming piece of work. It recalls his previous ensemble period piece, 'The Ice Storm', but loses that spellbinding film's intimacy.

Woodstock was so epic, and even if Lee doesn't use videos of the musicians on stage or any stock footage, it's hard for the characters to shine through the haze. However, Lee wisely chooses to make this film as "backstage" as possible. His eye for characterisation remains strong.

Period films can be hard to engage with from a modern audience's point of view, especially ones which are so rooted in a particular time at a specific location - this is a prime example. But still, it's another feather in Ang Lee's increasingly varied cap.

There's nothing really wrong with 'Taking Woodstock' - it's a fun, interesting true story that's well made and acted, but it feels like something was forgotten. Perhaps it was all that acid going around that disintegrated all the memories...