A Mighty Wind

I am a big fan of Christopher Guest's movies. One of my favorite memories from college was seeing This Is Spinal Tap for the first time. The freshness of the comedy blew me away. Christopher Guest was a star of that film, and he went on to direct several of his own films. A handful of these films have a distinct style. They are all shot in documentary format, and they all follow a myriad of characters who are all part of a plot revolving around a certain theme. "Waiting For Guffman" follows a group of characters as they attempt to put on a community musical in a small town in Missouri. "Best In Show" centers its attention around a group of oddballs who all converge at once on a prestigious dog show in Philadelphia. "For Your Consideration" satirizes the movie award season. It seems to me that the movie I am writing on, "A Mighty Wind," sort of got lost in the shuffle. I don't really know why, for it is every bit as sharp and every bit as poignant as the other movies.

The movie satirizes 60's folk music. It follows three musical groups who all come together in New York City to honor a folk promoter who has just passed away. One group (The New Main Street Singers) is a group of 9 whose great contribution to the folk genre involves a child who is named after a sweet potato. The second group (The Folksmen-the same three actors who made up Spinal Tap) come together after many years only to be frustrated by the lack of purity of almost any of the other folk artists around them. And Mitch and Mickey (brilliant portrayals by Eugene Levy and Catherine O' Hara) were the darlings of the folk movement who still have baggage. When they all come together (with many other brilliant ensemble characters, especially Fred Willard as the Main Street Singers' agent), the laughs are great.

But there are other things that make this movie special. It shares with Guest's other films a propensity for depicting apparently normal people who become increasingly abnormal as their layers are pealed back. But what makes this film shine is how close to reality it really is. All of the folk artists in this film take their art and themselves seriously. One need only watch footage of Peter Paul and Mary to see how achingly close to reality the satire is. Also, the actors in this movie are so believable. There is a moment when all the actors are watching Mitch and Mickey from off stage, and Parker Posey's character blinks back tears. The line between comedy and heartfelt drama is blurred here, though it doesn't take long for the next song to start, and again we realize we are watching a comedy film.

Finally, I also must talk about the songs in the movie. All of them are written to sound like folks songs, but none of them are profound. They sound like songs written by struggling artists. In this, they are both sad and hilarious. They are sad because the performers put so much stock in songs that aren't so profound. They are hilarious because....well, listen to the lyrics and hear for yourself.