Woodstock (film)

• Release Date: 1970
• Director(s): Michael Wadleigh
• Principal Performers: Joan Baez; Joe Cocker; Country Joe and the Fish; Crosby, Stills & Nash; Arlo Guthrie; Richie Havens; Jimi Hendrix; Jefferson Airplane; Janis Joplin; Janis Joplin; Santana; John Sebastian; Sha-Na-Na; Sly Stone; Ten Years After; The Who; Canned Heat

Woodstock is a documentary film about a famous music festival held in 1969. The movie was produced by Bob Maurice and directed by Michael Wadleigh. Also known as Michael Wadley, he spent most of his career as a cinematographer. Woodstock is one of two films he created as a director, and it is considered to be one of the greatest documentaries ever made. For many critics, the film represents the counterculture and hippie movement of the 1960s. The young people who came of age during this period sometimes are referred to as the "Woodstock generation."

About the Festival

Woodstock shows performances from the outdoor music festival known as the Woodstock Music and Arts Fair. It was billed as "three days of peace, music . . . and love." The festival took place from August 15–17, 1969, in an open field. Owned by Max Yasgur, the area was a 600-acre dairy farm in a town named Bethel in upstate New York. Bethel is about forty miles outside of the town of Woodstock. More than thirty artists performed at the festival for an audience of over 400,000 concertgoers. Most of the artists performed rock, folk, or soul music.

About the Music and Film

Michael Wadleigh put Woodstock together with the assistance of five other editors. They were Thelma Schoomaker, Stan Warnow, Yeu-Bun Lee, Jere Huggins, and Martin Scorsese, who later became an award-winning director. During the three days of the festival, Wadleigh and more than a dozen camera operators filmed about 120 hours of footage. In addition, there were dozens of production assistants and other workers on the crew. Wadleigh did not have the funds to pay the crew upfront. So he offered them "double or nothing." If the film was a success, they would receive double the agreed upon fee from the profits. If it were a failure, they would receive nothing.

Woodstock features performances from the following roster of artists: Richie Havens, Canned Heat, Joan Baez, the Who, Sha-Na-Na, Joe Cocker, Country Joe and the Fish, Arlo Guthrie, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Ten Years After, Jefferson Airplane, John Sebastian, Santana, Sly and the Family Stone, Janis Joplin, and Jimi Hendrix. A number of other artists who performed at the festival were not part of the film. They included Sweetwater, Creedence Clearwater Revival, and the Grateful Dead.

In the film, the artists who appeared were not all shown in the order that they performed on the festival stage. However, the first and last artists shown in the movie were the first and last to appear at the festival. The film opens with "Handsome Johnny" by Richie Havens and closes with "Villanova Junction" by Jimi Hendrix. In addition to performances, the film features interviews with some of the artists on the bill.

Many performances touched on the political and cultural issues of the day, including the Vietnam War and race relations. One of the most noteworthy performances was an instrumental, guitar-based version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" by Jimi Hendrix. The song features distortion and feedback, which mimicked the sounds of rockets and bombs firing. It is considered one of the landmark performances of Hendrix’s career.

The film not only focused on the performers, but also on the attendees. It includes interviews with concertgoers who discuss their concerns and the social issues of the 1960s. They are shown dancing and singing along to the music and interacting with one another. The film also shows them drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana, which was an illegal substance.

The festival took place on a rainy weekend, which is reflected in Woodstock. Many concertgoers became wet and soaked in mud. They called themselves the Mud People and can be seen playing and sliding in the mud. The film also includes clips with the local townspeople, recording their impressions of the festival.

Michael Wadleigh used a variety of film techniques to capture the experience and make viewers feel like they were at the festival. He included widescreen angles and split screens that showed two or three images simultaneously. The film also used stereo, surround-sound technology, which gave the music a full, rich sound.

A soundtrack album accompanied the film’s release. Entitled Woodstock: Music from the Original Soundtrack and More, it was issued by Atlantic Records. The album was very popular, reaching the number one position on Billboard’s Pop Album chart. A follow-up album, Woodstock 2, came out a year later. Joni Mitchell also wrote a song called "Woodstock" to commemorate the festival. Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young recorded a version that became a major hit.

Upon its initial release, Woodstock the film was 184 minutes in length. A longer, director’s cut was released in 1994. It ran 225 minutes and included several extra performances, such as a song by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.

An after-credits sequence also was added. It is a montage of images of noteworthy individuals who had died since the original release of the film. They include John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, and Che Guevara. Deceased artists who had performed at Woodstock, such as Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, also are included.

A fortieth anniversary version of Woodstock was released on Blu-ray and DVD in 2009. It features longer versions of songs and additional performances not seen in either theatrical version.

Significance

Woodstock was released by Warner Brothers in 1970. It was shown at the Cannes Film Festival that year but was not entered into the competition. The movie was a financial success and became the highest-grossing documentary film at that time. Woodstock also was a critical, award-winning success. It won the Academy Award for best documentary feature, Thelma Schoonmaker received a nomination for best editing, and the film was nominated for best sound. Decades later, in 1996, Woodstock was preserved by the Library of Congress in its National Film Registry.

After releasing Woodstock, Michael Wadleigh would only direct one other feature film, the horror movie Wolfen (1981). His recording of the Woodstock festival is considered to be a groundbreaking documentary that set the standard for later concert films.

Awards and nominations

Won

• Academy Award (1970) Best Documentary Feature ()

Nominated

• Academy Award (1970) Best Film Editing ()
• Academy Award (1970) Best Sound ()

Bibliography

Bell, Dale, ed. Woodstock: An Inside Look at the Movie that Shook Up the World and Defined a Generation. Studio City: Wiese Productions, 1999, Print.

Ebert, Roger. "Martin Scorsese & Co. Reassemble Woodstock." Roger Ebert Interviews. Ebert Digital, 15 Feb. 1970. Web. 18 Feb 2016.

Littleproud, Brad and Joan Hague. Woodstock: Peace, Music, and Memories. Iola: Krause, 2009. Print.

"Michael Wadleigh." Woodstock-Preservation Archives. Woodstock-Preservation Archives, 2005-2016. Web. 18 Feb 2016.

"Woodstock." Documentary Heaven. Documentary Heaven, 2016. Web. 18 Feb 2016.

"The Woodstock Music and Art Fair." Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, 2016. Web. 18 Feb 2016.