Woodyanders A five day roving rock concert travels across the country via train and performs live wherever they stop. This fantastic documentary covers the festival's Canadian leg of the tour, with the train making stops at Toronto, Winnipeg and Calgery. You can't beat the stellar line-up of first-rate musicians: the one and only Janis Joplin (her fiery performances of both "Cry Baby" and "Tell Mama" are absolutely electrifying show-stoppers), The Band (they hit it out of the ballpark with the rousing "Slippin' & Slidin'" and a potent rendition of "The Weight"), The Grateful Dead (in fine bluesy form with "Don't Ease Me In" and "New Speedway Boogie"), Sha Na Na (they do a spirited performance of "Rock and Roll is Here to Stay"), The Flying Burrito Brothers (their smooth-rolling rendition of "Lazy Day" really hits the soulful spot), and the Buddy Guy Blues Band (who burn it up with an incendiary cover of "Money"). Director Bob Smeaton keeps the pace hurtling along at the same constant speedy clip as the train and astutely nails a certain infectiously lowdown cool, breezy and mellow groovy vibe. All the musicians on the train put their individual egos aside, completely pour their hearts and souls into the giving the audiences their money's worth (the on-stage performances all seriously smoke, with Joplin in particular displaying a positively magnetic stage presence), and jam like crazy to the point where hardly anybody got any sleep and all the booze was drunk (the train had to make a special pit stop in Saskatoon to get more hooch). The cinematography by Peter Biziou, Bob Fiore and Clacke Mackey gives the film an appropriately rough'n'grainy look and makes neat frequent use of split screen. Best of all, there's a wonderfully warm and open communal spirit evident throughout which in turn makes this picture a true joy to watch. This spirit shines brightest when various musicians from different groups get together on stage to perform a marvelously sexy rendition of "C.C. Rider." While the concert itself had its fair share of problems (for example, people protested about having to buy tickets and demanded that they see the concert for free), the movie itself rates highly as one of the greatest rock documentaries to ever grace celluloid.

MisterWhiplash I liked how this film goes along in its tones moving along without too much drastic changes. There's the interspersed interviews with the original organizers, some of the band members (i.e. Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead), footage from behind the scenes at the shows and particularly on the train, and of course the musical performances. The music, if for nothing else for its core audience, makes the film essential to see. The nostalgia factor on this film is cool and inviting, unlike for example the strange non-musical segments of the Isle of Wight 1970 documentary. The Dead, Buddy Guy, Janis Joplin, Sha-na-na, the Flying Burrito Brothers, and among other acts the Band (a great rendition of 'Slippin' and Slidin'), will invite the audience of the 'hippie-rock' to check out the rare footage.As far as the film-making aspect of it goes, it does end up going more for the tried and successful Woodstock style of film-making, in which the footage is shown either in full screen or split-screen. This could be distracting and calling attention to itself in the style its done. But it works a lot more than it would if it were used on a not too good of a story- because it's got some different threads to work in. There's the audience's role in this, where in they were sometimes (maybe a lot of the time) un-cooperative with the ticket prices and police/security forces. There's the promoter's role in this, to keep this relatively low-key but expensive show on the road. And then there are the bands, who on the trains had the times of their lives, playing music, jamming, and going through the last flow of the 'era' before the 70's would take hold. Indeed, this was the last summer Joplin would have on the road. As a testament to the era it's not on the level of the original Woodstock or even the dark Gimme Shelter. But it's of high worth to anyone who'd want to seek it out- put it on, like some incense, have a party! A-

doug-decker As a person who attended the Toronto show, not showing Traffic, who have rare video appearances, was a drawback. I was hoping they would be in the extras on the DVD. I remember hearing from people after the event that it could be called "the rip-off express". Nothing could be further from the truth. Saying to someone that I saw one of Janis's last performance is always a highlight. The movie did show a lot of the "bullshit of the day". I laughed then and did when I saw the film. I saw the film in its limited release, and three times as a DVD. As concert videos go, it is very good, as a view of the times, (good and bad) it is also very good.

jfulbright Great film! "Never had such a good time in my life before".The highlight for me was a baby Bob Weir (rhythm guitarist for the Dead) chewing out a hippie for condoning violence against the Canadian police:"I talked to some of those guys, and those cops were BOSS!"He then went on to explain that one policeman had been injured so badly that he was in the hospital with a metal plate in his head because his skull had been fractured. Weir said the policeman didn't deserve that because he was only doing his job, and that the people who wanted the festival to be free were wrong because the musicians needed to make a living.People never understood that real hippies were not violent/political, and they didn't hate the police. The Haight Ashbury freaks got on well with the police, and there really weren't any problems until (get this) the "hippies" without jobs moved into the neighborhood.This film was a real joy, and it proves to the general public a couple of things:1. Hippie folk were not lazy. They were capable of extremely hard work. 2. Janis Joplin was a lot of fun, regardless of what the people in my hometown in Texas say. 3. Jerry Garcia simply wasn't built for EVER drinking alcohol. 4. That was one helluva train trip!