Rating: 
Summary: A Mighty Mockumentary
Review: When legendary folk music promoter Irving Stenbloom passes away, his son Jonathan decides to hold a tribute concert, re-uniting the three folks bands that his father helped to make famous: The Folksmen, The Main Street Singers, and Mitch and Mickey. What follows is a hilarious mockumentary following the reunions of the three music groups as well as Jonathan trying to organize the event.Eugene Levy is at his best as Mitch Cohen, the quite off-kilter folksinger who had a breakdown (of sorts) after a TV kiss with his partner Mickey Crabbe (played by Catherine O'Hara). His slowed speech and facial expressions are hysterical. John Michael Higgins and Jane Lynch are wonderful as Laurie and Terry Bohner, the leaders of The New Main Street Singers, who have their own religion involving colors. The rest of the cast is equally funny and well-cast: Fred Willard, Ed Begley Jr., Parker Posey, Christopher Guest, Michael McKeen, Bob Balaban, and the rest. Oh, and before I forget, the actors do their own singing as well. (Christopher Guest's folk style is wonderful!) The DVD picture and sound quality are top notch, and the disc is filled with great extras, including additional scenes, mock 1950s and 1960s TV performances of the groups, and the televised reunion-tributre concert as it was aired on PBN, a fictional public broadcasting station. Fans of "Best in Show," "Waiting for Guffman," and "This is Spinal Tap" will definitely love this film!
Rating:
Summary: A great gust from Guest
Review: It's hard for me to be critical of Chris Guest's "mockumentaries". I enjoy them too much -- and hope these brilliant players keep making these films for the rest of my life. I will say that I saw A Mighty Wind at the movies, where the audience rocked with laughter from start to finish and gave the film a warm round of applause at the end. What caught me by surprise in this latest effort from the talented troop of Guestians was the sentiment. Yes, this film will make you laugh, but thanks to brilliant performances by Eugene Levy and his old SCTV mate Catherine O'Hara, A Mighty Wind will make you cry too. Another surprise is the quality of the songs. Sure, the lyrics are a little off-center, but these tunes are incredibly catchy. I just ordered the CD, which has a few cuts that appear nowhere in the film or DVD. Wait until you hear the Folksmen cover the Stones' "Start Me Up." Hotchie-motchie! The DVD offers plenty of extras as well, including a half-hour of deleted scenes and the complete "Public Broadcast Network" telecast of the Ode to Irving concert. My only regret is that I didn't catch Guest and company on tour, when I understand they performed the concert in character. How I would have liked to clap and sing along to "Potato's in the Paddy Wagon" or shed a tear at Mitch and Mickey's "Kiss at the End of the Rainbow." Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't expect 'Spinal Tap'
Review: Coming from the actors and writers of 'This is Spinal Tap', I found this movie dissapointing. The jokes are not funny and at 91 minutes seems too long to endure. I only laughed once or twice, especially the line 'there was abuse in my family but it was mostly musical in nature.' The music is pretty bland and Eugene Levy's character is annoying and uninteresting but, Unfortunately, he seems to have most of the screen time in the film. The movie is basically a folk version of Spinal Tap but with less ideas and situations which makes the film drag on. I'm a fan of Spinal Tap and all the former SNL actors, but this movie just wasn't that interesting to me.
Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful balance between sentiment and satire
Review: It's hard to review a movie that I like as much as this one, because I know that my review is not going to do the film justice. I have only watched one other of Christopher Guest's "mockumentaries": WAITING FOR GUFFMAN. I'm certain that if I had watched that before I watched A MIGHTY WIND, I would have enjoyed it much more. But A MIGHTY WIND is far superior to any comedy that I have seen in almost 10 years. The script overflows with poetry mixed with comical genius. The performances are superb. Michael McKean (Lenny from "Laverne and Shirley") does a wonderful job as a member of the Folksmen (evidently a fictional version of the Kingston Trio). Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara (HOME ALONE, BEETLEJUICE) both turn in Oscar-worthy performances (not that they'll actually win; it nearly always goes to someone who doesn't deserve it). They play Mitch and Mickey, respectively, a sweetheart folk-duo from the 60s who suffered a very bitter break-up. The highlight of the movie for me (and probably many others) was when they are finally singing again, all those years later, their mega-hit "A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow", and...maybe I better not say too much. I do have to say that Levy's performance is one of the very best character-actor performances I have ever seen in a comedy. Possibly the very best. Since the movie is about folk music, that is where the majority of the sentiment and satire is. A lot of the time, it's hard to tell if the filmmakers are romanticizing music from groups like Peter, Paul and Mary and the New Christy Minstrels or if they're making fun of them. Personally, I think they successfully managed to do both at the same time. After the movie O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU? came out, people loved the music from that movie so much, that many people who didn't even like the movie still went out and bought the soundtrack. A MIGHTY WIND may have the same effect. The music is so good it will make you want to go out and immediately buy the soundtrack. I look forward to seeing Christopher Guest's next film.
Rating:
Summary: The music is great, but ...
Review: The movie drags on and on for too long. The pace is slow and the laughs are few and far in between. I have the soundtrack to this film and I love it. But when I finally got to rent the movie, I was extremely disappointed at how boring it was. Two stars for the last 20 minutes that made the movie worth watching. I recommend buying the soundtrack instead of renting this movie. You will get out of the soundtrack all that you would out of the movie and much more.
Rating: 
Summary: A faux documentary
Review: Filmed in the format of a faux documentary of a tribute concert to the late Irving Steinbloom, commonly revered as the business pioneer of the 1960's popular folk music craze, THE MIGHTY WIND follows the various performers and family members during the two weeks leading up to the reunion opening night in New York City. While there are several good laughs (most were included in the trailers), the periodic humor failed to compensate for the movie's overall dullness. I was bored too quickly and felt this movie dragged on for too long. It could have been a better movie if at least 30 minutes of footage was deleted. I wanted to like this movie but it fell short of my expectations.
Rating:
Summary: A Mighty Wind -- blows
Review: I would give it less than 2, but I did enjoy some of the music, and we laughed a few times. My family didn't enjoy this "Mockumentary" very much, and the kids were pretty bored. I really blew it for picking this one out, and I'll probably never hear the end of it from my family. It was just --- weird. And that's probably why we kept watching instead of turning it off. We kept waiting for it to make a little sense, but it never really delivered. When it was over, we just kind of looked at each other in wonder and shrugged. I'm not really sure why it received so many rave reviews. But if you really want to see something "different", this is it, because I've certainly never seen anything like it before. Or as my son Jason said, "Wha' Happened?"
Rating:
Summary: Transfer is excellent, audio is excellent
Review: We all know how funny it is...but let's get to the real nitty gritty. The audio and digital transfer are excellent. It will look great on your HDTV.
Rating:
Summary: Good DVD, Pretty Good Movie
Review: While I didn't find "A Mighty Wind" to be nearly as funny as "Waiting For Guffman" or "Best in Show", as an evolutionary chapter in the "fake documentary/musical/satire", it was thoroughly fulfilling. Levy & Guest are a little more low-key this time around. It was nice to see Spinal Tap reformed as a folk trio, and I would have enjoyed seeing more of the Folksmen and a little less of Mitch & Mickey. With each movie, Guest & Levy acquire a little bigger cast. Their troupe is uproariously funny, brilliant ad-libbers, and multi-talented. But I worry that they're getting a little too big & a little out of hand. With so many feature peformers, A Mighty Wind didn't devote enough time to any of the characters. The DVD has some nice features - in particular the "uncut" broadcast of the PBN special. I had previously noted the lamentable lack of the uncut performance of "Red, White, & Blaine" in the Waiting for Guffman DVD. This error is not repeated on the Mighty Wind DVD. There is the usual bevy of additional scenes, all of which add to the experience of the movie. In summary, it's a nice take-off on the whole folk music scene, panning Sonny & Cher, the Mamas & Papas, Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, et al. The music is disturbingly catchy, even the saccharine "Kiss at the End of the Rainbow." I've rated this DVD at four stars due largely to the lack of comparable intelligent satire anywhere else in moviedom. But I suspect that there is some saturation point for Guest/Levy comedies. Still, I can't wait for the next one, and can't help but wonder if Guest & Levy will set their sights next on Country & Western. If so, I formally propose the title track: "Lovin' You is Like Splittin' a Knotty Log".
Rating:
Summary: Mighty Good Time
Review: A Mighty Wind is a histarically funny movie directed by the great Christopher Guest. A Mighty Wind is the usual Christopher Guest mockumentary, but this time he takes on the world of folk singers. This movie, unlike any Adam Sandler movie, is full or clever and witty comedy. The film's stars are fantastic also. I myself love to see Catherine O' Hara onscreen and Fred Willard is completely to die for. Catherine O' Hara and Eugene Levy are perfect and endlessly funny as the famous Mitch & Mickey. Christopher Guest(also acts in this movie), Michael McKean, and Harry Shearer are greatly comical as the Folksman. Heres how the story goes:
When the news is heard that Irving Steinbloom has died, many a people are saddened. He was the founding father of many past folk groups. To remember his father, Jonathan Steinbloom plans on holding a memorial concert featuring three folk bands that his father led to fame. His task is to get THE NEW MAIN STREET SINGERS, THE FOLKSMEN, and MITCH & MICKEY. The first two are easy to get and they set out to practice their gigs, but Jonathan has trouble wooing Mitch & Mickey to appear together. Mickey is married to a happy husband, and Mitch is "lost in space" due to the fact that he and Mickey would never be together as lifelong parteners. After much persuading, Jonathan gets Mitch & Mickey to reunite. As this is happening Christopher Guest cuts back and forth to show how each band was formed and they talk about past experiences and so on. It is really pretty neat how well he puts it together. The movie is really engrossing and moves at a great pace and keeps you wondering what will happen to our beloved new folk friends. This movie was EXTREMELY good, and as you can tell from my review, I absolutly loved it. Buy this movie
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