When most of us think of the ’60s and the hippies these days, we remember San Francisco’s Summer of Love, the scene in Greenwich Village, or the Mods in London but not too much about the little pockets that surfaced all around the country. Like one that just happened to root for awhile in Stockbridge, Masachuesetts. Ray and Alice Brock, who’d taught some exceptional students at a nearby school, bought Trinity Church there in 1964 and made it into a place where their friends and former students could hang out and explore themselves.
So when Arlo Guthrie, son of famed folksinger Woody, found himself booted from college and at loose ends the next year, he hitched rides and made his way there. Alice also opened her restaurant in town and Arlo recorded a quick ditty for a radio commercial; that later became the chorus of his most famous song:
You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.
You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.
Walk right in it’s around the back.
Just a half a mile from the railroad track.
You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.
But then came the infamous Thanksgiving dinner that ended up causing so much hullabaloo. As depicted in the film, the dozens in attendance had a wild, wonderful time, full of love and happiness, with Vietnam and the world’s other troubles far, far away. Really, the problems were all afterwards, when Arlo and a friend packed up all the garbage they’d made into his VW Microbus and went looking for a place to dump it. Then, thanks to Offier Obie, a blind judge, and a building full of military madmen Guthrie encountered during his draft physical, he was able to turn it all into a classic folk story song, perhaps the greatest of that decade and surely better than any I’ve heard since.
Hollywood, of course, couldn’t resist such an obvious low hanging fruit. They made a deal to have Arlo star as himself, brought in a name director (Arthur Penn), and threw something together fast, clearly made in a haze of sweet smoke. A movie so bad it was almost good but, to be honest, not really. Yet still enjoyable if you can ignore the soap opera subplot and focus on Arlo’s antics and the inserted for the movie scenes with his dying dad. Woody (played by a semi-anonymous actor) lays flat out on a hospital bed and never moves, he’s too far gone with Huntington’s Chorea. James Broderick, Matthew’s dad and the only well-known actor in the cast, plays Ray; his professionalism shows and stands out almost as an oddity in this bunch of amateurs.
The efforts of Arthur Penn, a director generally held in high regard and coming off his Oscar nomination for Bonnie and Clyde, are barely noticeable throughout the film. As Charles Tatum, writing on the eFilmCritic site, says, there are really only two scenes where Penn seems to be actually working sober: the very last shot, of Alice standing in front of the church with a sad look on her face watching Arlo drive off as the camera swings around the yard, the trees occasionally cutting in front of her and Shelley’s funeral, featuring only an extremely young Joni Mitchell standing among the mourners, playing her guitar and singing her Song of the Aging Children.
Here you go, the lyrics and tab. Arlo’s semi-official website used to have the full 30+ minute performance for free download but not any more. I looked through Google but couldn’t find any free sites that have the whole song. Which is too bad because it’s a lot of fun to hear and it really isn’t in the movie.
Worth watching, a semi-authentic look at ’60s hippy life.
BillSaysThis 