A Mighty Wind

Directed by Christopher Guest

Written by Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy

Starring: Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, Michael McKean, Bob Balaban, Fred Willard, Mary Gross, Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara

MPAA: Rated PG-13 for sex-related humor

91 minutes runtime

How do you spell funny?  From the man who created the original mock documentary of the rock group Spinal Tap comes this great re-capturing of the days of goodness and light that was the folk music movement of the 1960s.  OK, we may as well get one thing straight right from the start: most people under 40 are not going to have a clue about this movie.  You just had to be there, experiencing the bleached purity that was popular folk music as telecast by Lawrence Welk, Ed Sullivan and, of course, the infamous “Hee-Haw.”

I admit it, I watched them, and tapped my sneakers to the happy sounds of the Kingston Trio.  I even boogied to the sounds of the champagne bubbles bursting on Larry Welk’s hour; but then I didn’t know any better.  I didn’t know communists existed, or black people, or blues or funk or drugs or alcohol; and neither Larry nor Ed was going to let the cat out of the bag.  It was all skirts and slacks and everyone matched.  And everyone smiled and said how happy they were and the set and the clothes and the music were as clean as the Mickey Mouse Club, and aimed at the same IQ.

In retrospect, there was never really anything wrong with the music.  The problem was that there was never anything right about it either.  Whether on TV or radio, the music was pretty-much just background for the commercials that sold us cars, washing machines and cigarettes.  

It’s hard to believe that America went from this land of make-believe, fostered by the cold war and the McCarthy trials, to the street demonstrations and free sex of the late 1960s.  But this is the point of “Mighty Wind,” the folk music foisted on us by the TV networks was a total sham, and we were the suckers!  We were watching what may as well have been animation for all the truth the networks would allow on the screen.  Maybe the adults of the time never figured it out, but we sure did.  Dylan hit the scene and we never went back to Mayberry.

But to bend back around to the point, it’s that shameless debasing of the music of the 1960s that’s the gut-bucket bass of “Mighty Wind,” and Guest milks it for all it’s worth.

The movie stars a promoter, Jonathan Steinbloom (Bob Balaban), a TV show commentator (Fred Willard) and three folk bands.  The promoter is organizing a tribute to his recently deceased father, Irving, who was instrumental in raising the three folk groups from obscurity to stardom.  Of course, Irving put them right back where they started when he was done with them, but none of the artists appears to remember that.  The three bands represent the classic unholy trinity of phony country acts.  The first is the extended family, where everybody plays, sings and thinks in perfect harmony, and no-one could possible think an impure thought.  OK, so the female lead had a history of porno flicks on her resume when she joined the band (In the real “Hee Haw,” Hugh Hefner’s first “love”, Barbi Benton, was a regular for 5 years.  I don’t remember any Playboy jokes).

The second folk band is the Kingston Trio look-alikes, the Folksmen.  The Folksmen are not out-and-out frauds; they simply have the unfortunate fate of being mindless tools.  The hilarious part is that they have somehow remained unaware that they have been fluffed, fleeced and flushed into the cellars of musicdom.  Were we like them when we watched the Beverly Hillbillies?  Yes, but we grew brains and the Folksmen never did.

The third group is a guy-gal couple, America’s sweet-hearts, who brought tears to the eyes of romantics across the land.  And the male half of the group continues to bring tears of laughter to our eyes as he tries to cope with life in the aftermath of stardom.  Sonny and Cher?  I know S&C were not folk, but everybody was kind of folksy in the early 60’s.  And they certainly had the love-on-stage thing down.  But then, so did Ike and Tina Turner....

In attempting to describe this most recent work of Christopher Guest, the first best method is to relate the movie to his three previous mocumentaries, “This Is Spinal Tap”, “Waiting for Guffman”, and “Best in Show”.  If you saw any of these three great satirical productions, you are somewhat prepared for “Wind.”  If you haven’t seen these three and enjoy humor that is so dry it threatens to vaporize, get started now.  Most of them are still available in video stores.

Mighty Wind is like a faux obituary, describing the life of someone who never existed.  Because (as we know now) the sterile people and music of those Disney Days never really existed either.  It was just an illusion.  Guest gives us a chance to look back and that music, be nostalgic, and poke fun at the institution and ourselves at the same time.  As the theme lyrics point out, ‘A Mighty Wind, It Blows You and It Blows Me.”  Well, you don’t need a weatherman to know a good movie either.