Glastonbury (2006)

User Rating:

6.5/10   

Director:

Julien Temple

Release Date:

14 April 2006 (UK)

Genre:

Documentary | Music

Tagline:

The mud. The music. The madness.

Plot:

A documentary on the 30th anniversary of Britain's best-known music festival. |

Plot Keywords:

Music Festival | Glastonbury Festival | Rock Music | Stonehenge | Glastonbury

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Björk	...	Herself
David Bowie	...	Himself
Billy Bragg	...	Himself
James Brown	...	Himself
Nick Cave	...	Himself
Michael Eavis	...	Himself
Steven Patrick Morrissey	...	Himself
Joe Strummer	...	Himself

MPAA:

Rated R for nudity, drug use, language and some sexual content.

Runtime:

UK:138 min

Country:

USA | UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

UK:15 | Singapore:M18 (cut) | USA:R | Finland:K-3 | South Korea:15 | Japan:R-15 | Australia:MA

Company:

HanWay Films

A lot like a home wedding video: If you were there, watching it back will probably be a fantastic experience. If not, expect to struggle in places.

Glastonbury feels a lot like a home wedding video: If you were there, watching it back will probably be a fantastic experience. If not, expect to struggle in places.

The movie is a mix of music, background events and smiley faces in silly costumes. While the smiley faces are important if you intend to create a sense of the atmosphere, two hours of this starts to drag. As you might expect, there is a fair bit of music, although inevitably only a tiny proportion of all the acts that have appeared at the festival over the years. Some clever production techniques are used, such as mixing performances from different years together, and using specific songs to provide a narrative to other festival scenes.

But this subtle narrative is about all there is to guide the uninitiated through the movie. This might be acceptable for the music, but not the interviewees. The movie seems to revel in this to the point of arrogance: Early on, it includes a scene in which the organiser, Michael Eavis, is talking to festival goers who have no idea who he is - much like me at that point in the movie.

Background events and history are covered, but not very well explored. Genuinely interesting themes, such as the involvement of travellers and the growing commercialisation of the festival, are dealt with rather too quickly. There is a lot of social history here, which could have made this quite a challenging documentary. But perhaps if Glastonbury had covered these fully, I would be bemoaning the lack of music or complaining it didn't convey a festival atmosphere?