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Festival Express
Metascore
85 out of 100

Universal acclaim - based on 26 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 25 out of 26
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 26
  3. Negative: 0 out of 26
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  1. The Hollywood Reporter
    Reviewed by: Richard James Havis
    100
    Festival Express should rightfully take its place in rock history as one of the great performance films of all time.
  2. San Francisco Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Joel Selvin
    100
    Must-see cinema for any serious rock fan.
  3. Baltimore Sun
    Reviewed by: Chris Kaltenbach
    100
    The real attraction is watching all these guys and gals on the train, so young, so dedicated to their music, so unconcerned about almost everything else.
  4. Film Threat
    Reviewed by: Phil Hall
    100
    Rich with wonderful music and images.
  5. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: J. Hoberman
    100
    Ultimate geezerfest and rock-doc holy grail.
  6. Variety
    Reviewed by: Eddie Cockrell
    100
    An instant ancillary classic for music fan.
  7. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Richard Harrington
    100
    Most of Festival Express resonates with the power and passion, even the innocence, of the era.
  8. The A.V. Club
    Reviewed by: Noel Murray
    90
    The sociological angle of Festival Express is a narrow one--perhaps too narrow--and doesn't overwhelm the film's real selling point, which is some of the best-looking and best-sounding footage of counterculture icons ever screened.
  9. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: Dave Kehr
    90
    To watch the biggest stars of their time in casual conversation, trading riffs and passing bottles, without benefit of publicists, handlers and security goons is to relive an innocent, anarchic time in the entertainment business when music, not marketing, was at the center of the enterprise.
  10. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Ann Hornaday
    90
    A delirious piece of pop ephemera.
  11. Austin Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Marjorie Baumgarten
    89
    It was the greatest rock & roll party you never heard of.
  12. Chicago Tribune
    Reviewed by: Michael Wilmington
    88
    The results are spine-tingling. There's only one thing to say about this movie and its rescuers, recovered from the dead--and the Dead: Rock on.
  13. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Elizabeth Weitzman
    88
    A raucous, riveting account of the greatest party you were never invited to.
  14. Portland Oregonian
    Reviewed by: M. E. Russell
    83
    Slight on personality but long on music; Janis Joplin elevates it to near-great concert-film status.
  15. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: Hazel-Dawn Dumpert
    80
    To watch Joplin, Rick Danko, Jerry Garcia and Mickey Hart, all massively wasted, giggling and jamming, is a delight tempered by the knowledge that Joplin would be dead just months later, with the rest but one following after.
  16. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Kevin Crust
    80
    There were greater rock festivals and there are greater rock movies, but nothing existed quite like this mobile bacchanal, nicely preserved in Festival Express.
  17. Christian Science Monitor
    Reviewed by: David Sterritt
    75
    Full of bright colors, offbeat people, tuneful sounds.
  18. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Glenn Garvin
    75
    A hard and hilariously ironic look at the bottom line. As it turns out, love was not all you needed; hard cash came in handy, too.
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  19. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Megan Lehmann
    75
    As this Woodstock-on-wheels careens through the countryside, stopping only to play for thousands of hirsute revelers -- and, once, to stock up on booze in Saskatoon -- its famous passengers celebrate with delirious joy the pure, unadulterated magic of music.
  20. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Steven Rea
    75
    Both a concert film and a more intimate thing: a fascinating, fly-on-the-wall (or fly-in-the-dining-car) glimpse of some clearly blotto rock legends talking, singing, hanging out. The fact that a good number of them are now dead makes it doubly memorable.
  21. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Steve Morse
    75
    Extraordinary.
  22. The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
    Reviewed by: Liam Lacey
    75
    The film is not about the audience's shared experience, and a lot more about how cool it is to have a backstage pass.
  23. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: Bill White
    75
    With the exception of some minor glitches in the sound synchronization and a nighttime performance of The Band's "The Weight" that is uncharacteristically grainy, the film looks and sounds great.
  24. Dallas Observer
    Reviewed by: Melissa Levine
    70
    A piece of rock-and-roll history--but it isn't perfect.
  25. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: Hank Sartin
    70
    The concert footage is generally quite good, and Joplin is astonishing, but with so many hours of footage you'd think there would be more unexpected moments.
  26. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Maitland McDonagh
    60
    The result is a vivid record of live acts whose rough-edged immediacy is an integral part of their appeal.
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