Crossroads: An Appreciation

Ah, Ralph Macchio. Come back. We miss you.

Well, not really.

It's not easy, having one of my favorite guilty pleasures from the Me Decade continually confused with Britney Spears' lone foray into the world of teeny-bopper cinema. It's also not easy explaining to folks that its not that movie, its the one where the Karate Kid joins an elderly black man on a road trip to the deep south to learn how to play blues guitar.

See? You're running away.

But, wait. Before you high-tail it outta here, let me try this again.

Maybe you've heard of Robert Johnson. A legend of Delta Blues, Johnson recorded 29 haunting songs and then died. How he died is unknown. Some say he was shot, some that he was stabbed. Some say that the man that killed him was the husband of one of Johnson's many lovers. Some say he simply vanished.

Some say the devil took his due. For a long time, it was said that Johnson had sold his soul to the devil to learn how to play guitar like he did. His mysterious death only added fuel to that fire.

In one of his more famous songs (covered by Eric Clapton, among many, many others), "Crossroads," Johnson sings "You can run, you can run. Tell my friend, Willie Brown. I been standing at the crossroads. I been sinking, I been sinking down."

And when Crossroads, the movie, opens up, Eugene (Macchio, playing Macchio) is tracking Willie Brown down. Eugene is a classically trained guitarist (I know, I know...stay with me) with a deep love for the sound of the Delta Blues. He's so obsessed, he's become convinced that the Willie Brown Robert Johnson sings about is real, alive, and living in New York City.

Eugene wants to find him, because although Johnson recorded 29 songs, there was one he never laid down. One song he took to his grave. Eugene reasons that, if anyone will know this song, it's Brown, a friend of Johnson's when he was alive. He's convinced that, armed with that song, he can finally be what he wants to be, a real bluesman.

He finds Brown, aged and crotchety, rotting away in an Old Folks home (or, as the video box tells us, "from prison"! Is this a black thing?), and Brown tells him that if Eugene will get him out of there, he'll teach him Robert's lost song. Only, once they're out, Willie won't give him the song. Not until he's back down south. What Eugene doesn't know, is that Willie desperately needs to get back to the Crossroads. The place Robert told him about, all those years ago.

The place he met the devil one night.

I won't spoil any more for you. Should you have the good fortune to run across this flick in your video store (and its unlikely, given that they haven't bothered to release it on DVD), pick it up. Yes, Ralph Macchio is in it. But he's pretty good in it. Really. Joe Seneca, who plays Willie Brown, is marvelous. In a better world, this man would have been as big as Morgan Freeman or, at the least, Ozzie Davis. Damn fine acting. And he blows a mean bluesharp, too.

And the end, a musical duel of eargasmic proportions, is genuinely stirring. Eugene finds himself circling back to himself, finding himself, and the song that wins the day for him is the one he's spent the movie trying to escape.

Ry Cooder produced the soundtrack, and with the exception of one terribly cheesy 80's style "blues" song its solid, evocative stuff. Cooder's one of our great musicologists, and some of the pieces in the film are golden.

I'm not saying this is a great film. It's not. Macchio's pretty good, but I'm kind, and I can't help but wonder how much better the film would have been with a more credible lead. Preferably an actual black person. Jamie Gertz is useless as the tough girl with a heart of gold. But there are many nice moments. Macchio and Seneca's wooing of a deep south bar crowd is fun, the great Joe Morton pops up in a fantastic and somehow deeply creepy performance, the script's obvious respect for the Blues, and for its traditions and legends and Myth, is unique and appreciated.

I saw this movie for the first time on one of those 80's cable channels, and it made me go out and buy a Muddy Waters album. For that alone, I'll always love it.