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Woodstock Not Worth the Trip

Mixed reviews for 1960s coming-of-age flick

By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff

Posted Aug 28, 2009 1:08 PM CDT

(Newser) Taking Woodstock isn’t really about the music: it’s more about coming of age on the outskirts of the festival. Critics are lukewarm about Ang Lee's latest effort:

  • “You can’t deny the smiling mood that wafts through the film like incense,” admits Anthony Lane of the New Yorker, “and to that extent it honors the original three days; but not once does a character’s show of feeling stir you, send you, or stop you in your tracks.”

  • Stephen Holden of the New York Times calls the “likable, humane” film “a gentle, meandering celebration of personal liberation at a moment when rigid social barriers were becoming more permeable.”
  • “All the tie-dye, reefer, skinny-dipping, split-screen cinematography and acid-trip psychedelics can't make up for the film's major sin of omission: the music,” Peter Travers writes for Rolling Stone.

In this film publicity image released by Focus Features, Demetri Martin, left, and Eugene Levy are shown in a scene from Taking Woodstock.
In this film publicity image released by Focus Features, Demetri Martin, left, and Eugene Levy are shown in a scene from "Taking Woodstock."   (AP Photo/Focus Features, Ken Regan)
In this film publicity image released by Focus Features, Kelli Garner, left, Demetri Martin, center, and Paul Dano are shown in a scene from Taking Woodstock.
In this film publicity image released by Focus Features, Kelli Garner, left, Demetri Martin, center, and Paul Dano are shown in a scene from "Taking Woodstock."   (AP Photo/Focus Features, Ken Regan)
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A trailer for the film.   (YouTube)

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COMMENTS
Showing 1 of 1 comment
It_Smells_Funky.
Aug 28, 2009 9:24 AM CDT
no! i'm seeing this, no matter what, im a big demetri martin fan, big ang lee fan, and i think the critics were especially harsh considering they thought they were heading into a movie regarding the music instead of an outside story.
 

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