Message to Love
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| Message to Love: The Isle of Wight Festival 1970 | |
|---|---|
 Paul Rodgers of the band Free singing "All Right Now" in front of the crowd |
|
| Directed by | Murray Lerner |
| Produced by | Murray Lerner |
| Written by | Murray Lerner |
| Editing by | Greg Sheldon (performance sequences) Stanley Warnow (as Stan Warnow) Einar Westerlund |
| Distributed by | Castle Music Pictures Strand Releasing |
| Release date(s) | 21 February 1997 (USA) |
| Running time | 127 min |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Allmovie profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Message to Love (directed and produced by Murray Lerner) is a feature documentary film of the Isle of Wight Festival 1970. The film unsparingly depicts the myriad problems associated with the festival, the main program of which was held on the weekend of August 28-30, 1970, including gate-crashing, numerous crowd incursions onto the stage, Kris Kristofferson being booed offstage and head promoter Rikki Farr's rants against the audience, which only intensified as the situation deteriorated: "We put this festival on, you bastards!" In addition, several near-riots occurred over the price of tickets, as well as during several of the performances that took place during the weekend, especially Jimi Hendrix's final appearance in England.
Due to financial difficulties, Message to Love wasn't released until 1997, 27 years after the event, though it premiered at a San Jose film festival in 1995.[1] Lerner's copious footage has also recently been repurposed to create complete-performance DVD releases by Hendrix ("Blue Wild Angel"), Miles Davis ("Miles Electric - A Different Kind of Blue"), The Who ("Live at the Isle of Wight Festival 1970") and Jethro Tull ("Nothing is Easy: Live at the Isle of Wight 1970").
The film derives its title from a song that Jimi Hendrix performed, and a brief clip is shown during the opening credits.
[edit] Performances in order of appearance
- Jimi Hendrix ("Machine Gun", "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Foxy Lady", "Message To Love", "Purple Haze")
- Emerson, Lake & Palmer ("Pictures at an Exhibition")
- The Who ("Young Man Blues", "Naked Eye")
- Ten Years After ("I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes")
- The Doors ("When the Music's Over", "The End")
- The Moody Blues ("Nights in White Satin")
- Free ("All Right Now")
- Jethro Tull ("My Sunday Feeling")
- Taste ("Sinner Boy", "Gamblin' Blues")
- Family ("The Weaver's Answer")
- Kris Kristofferson ("Me and Bobby McGee")
- Joan Baez ("Let it Be")
- John Sebastian ("Red Eye Express")
- Tiny Tim ("There'll Always Be an England")
- Leonard Cohen ("Suzanne")
- Joni Mitchell ("Woodstock", "Big Yellow Taxi")
- Miles Davis ("Call it Anything")
[edit] References
- ^ Message to Love: Isle of Wight Festival. Retrieved on 2008-03-12.
[edit] External links
- Message to Love at the Internet Movie Database
- Message to Love: The Isle of Wight Festival at Allmovieguide.com
