Crossroads (1986)

Excellent adaptation.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

This still remains the guitar fan go to movie, this soundtrack is unsurpassed. It has it all, classical & blues acoustic, then R&B / rock electric. This is from a time people argued whose the best guitarist or drummer. Sadly now music challenges are who can rhyme most insults. Yes I think rap should be spelt with a c, and DJ sampling is nothing other than theft. There'll never be great musicians again apart from niche listening.

First thing "Crossroads" brought to mind was The Devil Went Down to Georgia (incidentally the only Charlie Daniels song I know). It taps into the same mythology of brokered souls and damnation, but it's nicely packaged as a road movie. Jon Seneca quickly works his charms as the cantankerous elder, while Macchio proves his musicianship in scenes that make it easy for us to scrutinize. Hollywood movie or not, it's a treat to see him to head-to-head with Steve Vai.But even more than that, he's well-suited to a story of hard lessons and young heartbreak. In the end, it's the performances that really make this a fine movie.7/10

Having just come back from a road trip in the Southern US, the first cinematographic need was for some movie set in those fascinating Mississippi landscapes, and "Crossroads" was one of them. The first opening blues notes make you enter the mood of a lazy, sweet, melancholy, sun-beaten land where people can still today feel till the utmost the pleasure of a music that gets under your skin and makes you shiver. It's the story of a young white boy dreaming of becoming a great blues guitarist, looking for a lost song by Robert Johnson, one of the greatest blues men, ever. The boy knows that the still living harmonica player Willie Brown was a partner of the legendary blues musician Robert Johnson, manages to find him in a nursing home and makes a deal with the old man. He'll help him come back a crossroads where he had once signed a pact with the devil to become a great musician, if the old man teaches him the lost Johnson song. It's a movie about the need to go that land, to the Mississippi delta, to see, feel the places where blues had its origins. It's also the story of an odd friendship between two generations, two worlds, but united by the same passionate longing for a music, a mood that only that music can fully express. And indeed the good soundtrack, makes a difference, sly and pleasant to be listened. Willie once tells the boy the meaning of blues and says: "The blues ain't nothing' but a good man feelin' bad, thinking' 'bout the woman he once was with". Maybe...But if you have a chance, go to Clarksdale (MS) where three crossed guitars at a crossroads, mark where Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil to play his own blues, and don't miss some live blues at Red's, not far from that same crossroads: you will taste some amazing live blues music, enjoy the company of hearty people, and experience some real South.

I won't bother to detail the plot, because that's already been done here, but I will share my impressions of the movie: First off, the music was ridiculously good. The acting was a close second. Joe Seneca was splendid as the old bluesman, he was at his best when busting Ralph Macchio's balls for being from Long Island. Macchio himself was just okay, although he obviously learned how to play guitar for this movie. (It's Ry Cooder on the soundtrack and Vai stands in as a body double for the extreme closeups of Macchio's hands, but you can tell Macchio is playing the parts.) It was even a treat to see Alan Arbus, my favorite recurring character on MASH (Dr. Friedman) make an appearance. My favorite though were the actors who portrayed Scratch and his assistant. They both looked like the cat that ate the canary, like a couple of guys who love their job and are in on the joke. I'm going to have to go against the grain though and say I didn't like the climactic guitar duel. I've got nothing against Steve Vai, but the entire movie is about the blues, and at the end it emerges that the devil's house guitarist is a heavy metal clown, making stage moves that would look ridiculous even at a Def Leppard show. It was completely incongruous and hit a real sour note for me. But other than that, this movie is great, and a must-see for any music lover.