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Poster (c) Warner Brothers
The third in Christopher Guest’s mockumentary series (Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show), or fourth, if you count This Is Spinal Tap, is A Mighty Wind. It’s the funniest and the best out of the four.
A Mighty Wind basically revolves around three folk bands. The Folksmen consist of Alan Barrows (Christopher Guest), Jerry Palter (Michael McKean), and Mark Shubb (Harry Shearer), and they are laid back and comfortable. Mitch and Mickey was a duet with Mitch Cohen (Eugene Levy) and Mickey Crabbe (Catherine O’Hara), and Mitch was just released from a mental hospital, but he may not be fully healed. The New Main Street Singers are a cult-like group of nine or so. Some members include Terry and Laurie Bohner (John Michael Higgins, Jane Lynch) and Sissy Knox (Parker Posey). The son of Irving Steinbloom, a concert promoter with a penchant for folk music, named Jonathan Steinbloom (Bob Balaban), decides to have a reunion show for these three bands to memorialize his recently deceased father.
Obviously, it has a lot of improv, but it was hilarious. The Folksmen’s first record didn’t have a hole in center, making it “hard to center, but you could poke a hole in it if you wanted.” Many other times had me laughing so hard that I almost fell on the floor. I found that Fred Willard was the funniest (“Wha’ happened?”), but I also really liked the Folksmen and Mickey. Mitch didn’t do anything for me. He didn’t make me laugh that much, and if I did, it was for what else happened in the scene (like at the hotel).
Balaban probably has the most screen time (and a larger role than his roles in other Guest movies). He was worrying over every little thing (such as thorny plants may injure guests), and he was very funny. Balaban proved that he could lead a movie. Guest, McKean, and Shearer were quite funny, especially when Shearer, who doesn’t talk much, got in a little bit of improv. I liked the songs they sing, such as “Eat at Joe’s”. O’Hara was very funny, and I like seeing her act. Levy was good at acting, but he didn’t make me laugh much. Everyone else was funny.
Like all of the other Guest movies, there’s a giant, climactic scene (the musical in Waiting for Guffman, the dog show in Best In Show), and this one is very good, at the reunion show. We hear a lot of the songs, and they’re very funny. I wonder if everyone did their own singing. I would bet so. Something I like about Guest movies is that there can be a lot packed into a little amount of time. 90 minutes can hold lots of humor, character development, and more musical numbers than most musicals. The time seems longer than usual, because most of the movie is talking, but it is still fascinating. I would like to see more people try the mockumentary genre; although none can do it was well as the almighty Guest.
Rated PG-13 for sex-related humor.
Review Date: May 4, 2003