It's July 1969. In the Middle East Israel and Egypt are fighting the War of Attrition. In Vietnam more than 800 US troops would die before the month was out. On the moon Neil Armstrong was taking one giant leap for mankind, and in a small rural town in upstate New York Jake and Sonia Teichberg's dilapidated motel is being taken over by a bunch of hippies.
They're there at the invitation of the Teichberg's son Eliot (Demetri Martin). In a last gasp effort to save his parents' business from foreclosure, Eliot has offered the rundown El Monaco as the HQ for the promoters of music festival which has just had its permit pulled by a neighbouring town. He also finds them a new venue in the fields of a nearby dairy farm owned by Max Yasgur (a pleasantly subdued Eugene Levy).
This act borne of desperation would make Bethel the centre of the universe the following month as more than half a million people descended on Max's 600 acres for 3 days of peace and music known as Woodstock.
TAKING WOODSTOCK is Eliot's story told in a spellbinding blend of drama, comedy and documentary. Director Ang Lee doesn't simply recreate those two months in the summer 69, he transports us back there and lets us live them as if we were actually there.
Where Michael Wadleigh's epic 1970 "Woodstock" documentary focused on the heart of the festival, capturing the musical acts on the main stage, Lee's interest is in the periphery of the event. This is not a story about the music or the performers. Most of the action takes place at the Teichberg's motel, where Eliot finds himself engulfed by the events he has unwittingly unleashed and battling with an overbearing and ungrateful mother who can see only disaster and financial ruin ahead.
Eliot's also struggling to come to terms with his sexuality and the fear that his parents will disown him. But with a little help from a muscular ex-Marine turned drag queen (an interesting turn from Liev Schrieber) the uptight Jewish interior designer finds himself as hundreds of thousands of young people flood past his front door to lose themselves in the music, drugs and free love.
Despite that, Eliot's actually the straightest character in the story and that makes it easier for us to experience events through his eyes. Forty years removed from the height of the hippie movement, many of us will share his bewilderment and surprise at the good natured "turn on, tune in, drop out" behaviour he witnesses. Eliot puts a human face on what is now a legendary event.
Lee has a solid track record as a creative and original director (Brokeback Mountain", "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon") but he doesn't entirely avoid the drug and hippie cliches of the era although I'm not sure what else he could have done. They may now be cliches but they're also pretty accurate representations of the time which have unfortunately since become overused.
What's more irritating is Imelda Staunton's unrestrained portrayal of a very New York Jewish mother. Where 10 would be more than adequate Staunton cranks her performance up to 12. It's too much especially when there's not a hint of humour in her behaviour.
But Mrs Teichberg aside TAKING WOODSTOCK is a real trip. I'm never going to be able to say I was there but, thanks to Ang Lee's gentle sweet-natured storytelling I can now feel as if I were there.
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