Film revives folk
What’s exciting about a movie devoted to folk music? At first glance, nothing.
However, A Mighty Wind is a strange and wonderful satirical story about a musical genre that is not on most people’s radar. This movie will probably be a blip on most movie-goer’s radar screens but is definitely worth the price of admission.
Surprisingly, the music in the film is addictive, making people in the audience slap their knees to the beat of the guitars, banjos and ukuleles. Not only is the music catchy, it’s hilarious. The music is the true star of the film.
At times, the film feels disjointed and the flow is interrupted by cuts from group to group.
“Mitch & Mickey” are the most well developed of the bands. Played by Eugene Levy (Bringing Down the House, American Pie) and Catherine O’Hara (Best in Show, Home Alone), the duo has a chemistry that the rest of the bands are lacking.
Directed by Christopher Guest, whose credits also include This is Spinal Tap and Best in Show, the film is a comedic documentary that feels like “VH1’s Behind the Music” meets “Seinfeld.”
The film reunites the majority of the cast from Best in Show another comedic diamond in the rough.
Like Guest’s past films, this movie is unique because it does not rely on a script but rather an outline of the story, leaving the majority of the spoken lines up to the cast. This notion is what creates the films best moments. The fact that there is no actual script makes it easier for the audience to actually believe what they are seeing.
The true secret of this is the fact that it is so unconventional. Creative films like A Mighty Wind only come along once in a few years, and although this film is not as sharp and cunning as Guest’s past films, it still is enough to keep an audience entertained for an hour and a half.
A Mighty Wind blew a breath of fresh air into a month full of otherwise blase movies.
Film revives folk
