Crossroads (1986 film)
| Crossroads | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Walter Hill |
| Produced by | Mark Carliner (producer) Mae Woods (associate producer) Tim Zinnemann (executive producer) |
| Written by | John Fusco |
| Starring | |
| Music by |
Ry Cooder Steve Vai |
| Cinematography | John Bailey |
| Edited by | Freeman A. Davies |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
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Release date
|
March 14, 1986 |
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Running time
|
96 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $5,839,000 (United States) |
Crossroads is a 1986 American coming-of-age musical drama film inspired by the legend of blues musician Robert Johnson. Starring Ralph Macchio, Joe Seneca and Jami Gertz, the film was written by John Fusco and directed by Walter Hill and features an original score featuring Ry Cooder and Steve Vai on the soundtrack's guitar, and harmonica by Sonny Terry. Vai also appears in the film as the devil's guitar player in the climactic guitar duel.
Fusco was a traveling blues musician prior to attending New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where he wrote Crossroads as an assignment in a master class led by the screenwriting giants Waldo Salt and Ring Lardner, Jr. The student screenplay won first place in the national FOCUS Awards (Films of College and University Students) and sold to Columbia Pictures while Fusco was still a student.
Eugene Martone (Ralph Macchio) is a classical guitar student at the Juilliard School for Performing Arts in New York City who has an obsession for the blues, especially the famed Robert Johnson. Most intriguing are the legends surrounding exactly how Johnson became so talented, notably the one claiming he "sold his soul to the Devil at the crossroads" along with a supposed lost song that Johnson never recorded. Eugene meets the blues musician Willie Brown in an old folks prison and plays him some blues on his guitar. Willie finally admits that he is Blind Dog Fulton, a bandmate of Johnson's, and says he knows the missing song but refuses to give it to Eugene unless the boy breaks him out of the facility and gets him to Mississippi, where he has unfinished business to settle. Eugene refuses, and Willie says he thought Eugene might be a "Lightnin' Boy" but he's just a "chicken ass". Eugene reluctantly agrees to help, and they head to Memphis, Tennessee.
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