Whether it’s rumors of records played backward that unlock Satanic messages or controversial tracks like the Rolling Stones’s Sympathy for the Devil, blues and rock ‘n roll music have long had their associations with Lucifer.
So in Crossroads (1986), a film about an aspiring “Bluesman,” naturally Old Scratch himself comes out to play.
Written by John Fusco, an ex-blues musician, the story was inspired by Fusco hearing about an older man with a harmonica at a rest home.
Fusco wondered if that man could be a long-lost, famous former musician?
Mixing his fictional older harmonica player with the myth of Robert Johnson selling his soul to the devil in exchange for talent, Fusco’s imaginative spark grew into the script that became Crossroads.
Yet while Crossroads was familiar hauntings for Fusco, it was new territory for its director, Walter Hill.
Hill had been (and still is) mostly known for his action and western genre pictures.
But Hill’s motivation wasn’t all cash. With his father’s health ailing at the time of filming, Hill saw his relationship with his father in the lead characters.
Despite Hill’s personal connection to the story, like a struggling blues musician, the movie went out to perform and came back with less than $6 million at the box office.
With Ralph Macchio again taking the lead role in a coming-of-age mentor/mentee storyline, the movie was often dismissed as a rehash of 1984’s The Karate Kid.
But critical re-appraisals have been positive. Today, the film stands at a solid 76% on the review site Rotten Tomatoes (at the time of writing).
And the climactic guitar duel against the devil, featuring the iconic Steve Vai himself as Beelzebub’s man, is well-known to six-string slingers (with YouTube clips of the scene hitting over 60 million views).
So is Crossroads a discarded flop or an overlooked good time?
The Plot of Crossroads:
Classical guitar student Eugene Martone (Ralph Macchio) is obsessed with the blues. He’s on a mission to find the lost song of legendary guitar player Robert Johnson and record it.
Soon, Martone’s research reveals an older man he suspects to be Johnson’s friend, harmonica player Willie Brown (Joe Seneca), is alive at a minimum security hospital.
To get close to Brown, Martone takes a part-time job at the hospital.
After many denials, Brown admits to knowing Johnson. He strikes a deal with Martone: If Martone can break him out of the hospital and return him to Mississippi, he will teach him the lost song of Robert Johnson.
Martone, believing recording the song will help him kickstart a music career, agrees.
As the pair travels to Mississippi, young drifter Frances (Jamie Gertz) makes them into a trio.
And while Eugene dreams of fame and fortune and courts Frances, Willie has nightmarish visions of a mysterious crossroads in Mississippi.
The Rest of the Main Cast Includes:
- Joe Morton as Scratch’s Assistant
- Robert Judd as Scratch
- Steve Vai as Jack Butler
- Harry Carey Jr. as Bartender
- Dennis Lipscomb as Lloyd
- John Hancock as Sheriff Tilford
- Gretchen Palmer as Beautiful Girl/Dancer
- Allan Arbus as Dr. Santis
- Al Fann as Pawnbroker
- Wally Taylor as O.Z.
- Sammie Minniefield Jr as Pete
- Tim Russ as Robert Johnson
- Tex Donaldson as John McGraw
- Guy Killum as Willie at 17
- Akosua Busia as Woman at Boardinghouse
- Edward Walsh as Harley Terhune
- Allan Graf as Alvin
What’s Working Well Here:
Good Bones, + 2 Points
The film is well-structured, setting up compelling drama.
Eugene is a classical guitar student at New York’s prestigious Julliard School. But the young punk takes the air out of the room when he throws a blues guitar lick into Mozart’s Turkish March.
Later, Eugene’s instructor warns him about throwing away his talent. It sets up a conflict between classical and the “primitive” blues music, as his instructor refers to it, that Eugene would much rather play.
Willie reinforces the conflict, knocking Eugene’s dream down from the other side. He believes hardship is essential to blues, and he laughs at the lack of “suffering” of a student from Long Island.
But Willie, in between lectures on proper bluesman protocol, develops a begrudging respect for Eugene’s persistence.
Riding the tried and true spine of a mentor/mentee story, Eugene and Willy hit the road, each with something to offer the other. And their partnership, in an authentic way, evolves into a friendship.
Lore Moments and Flashbacks, +1 Point
The film frequently flashes back to Willie’s past encounter with the devil’s assistant, giving us a hint of folklore and different cinematography to set the alt-world mood.
Putting the sequence into a sepia tone is the shortcut for saying it’s the past. Still, the nightmares are slightly surreal as older Willie draws closer to Mississippi. In them, the devil’s assistant walks through a too-small door and flashes a demonic smile, the world seemingly spinning around as he does so.
Underrated Performances, +3 Points
Seneca and Macchio have an obvious chemistry.
Though Macchio is once again the pupil to a wise master, you don’t feel he’s leaning on the same strokes of The Karate Kid’s Daniel LaRusso.
Unlike LaRusso, who had to find courage, Martone already has plenty of moxie. It’s the finer points and actual realities of life on the road or the soul required to play the blues that Willie wants to impart (or hold against him for not having).
Martone is cocky and confident, but you can see he’s green – fearful and intimidated in many moments.
Joe Seneca’s Willie Brown, a man on a mission to confront the devil, plays the curmudgeon with a soft heart without cliche. He has the poise of a showman with the dogged determinedness to survive life on the road, “hoboing” it.
Gertz, as Frances, is cynical and hardened, trying to grow up faster than she actually can. She talks tough but is clearly vulnerable, just like the other three.
Honorable mentions to Joe Morton as the Devil’s assistant and Robert Judd as the Devil.
Morton has the sinister smile of someone who takes too much pleasure in a dirty job. And Judd’s devil is an all-business variety who loves himself a contest for a soul.
Appropriation Acknowledged, +1 Point
The story of a white kid from Long Island learning the blues could bring up questions of appropriation or even incite controversy if poorly handled.
Yet the movie intelligently doesn’t duck the issue, nor make it the crux of the movie.
Willie calls Eugene “just another white boy ripping off our music,” which is a sensible nod.
And characters in the movie often look at the white kid with a slide on his finger and a Telecaster slung over his shoulder sideways.
But the film wins this battle because it lets the issue be there – natural reactions to the situation. And it doesn’t make Martone into a white savior – someone who will reclaim or bring back the blues in some way.
Rock for Your Soul, +3 Points
**Small Spoilers Here**
Eugene’s guitar duel against Jack Butler (Steve Vai) is the enduring scene from the movie, which you’ll find linked to in guitar forums around the Web.
Its trick is making the showdown like a gunfighter duel.
The opening has a call-and-response nature, as they take turns trying to intimidate each other. Then, with Butler frustrated he hasn’t won’t yet, they start giving the fretboards all they have.
You knew Vai’s playing would be extraordinary, but his acting was the show’s surprise. He gets into the devil’s man persona, shuffling his hips and making goofy, intimidating faces that say, “Can you top this right here?”
In some ways, the guitar playing is so technical, fingers flying over the necks, that it can be difficult to tell who has the upper hand at moments. It may have benefitted from being dumbed down and more accessible to us laypeople.
But Eugene’s piece that wins it, a neoclassical metal composition borrowing from violinist Paganini’s Caprice No. 5, is well-loved in guitar circles for a reason.
It’s an elegant moment, as Eugene, just about to lose, leans into his classical training to get him out of the jam.
The original idea had been a slide guitar battle, and some have questioned why a movie about the blues ends in a duel against an 80s shredder.
I can see the argument, but I think it works as a battle between something from the past and something from the current (this was the 80s) crop of music.
Fun Fact: Paganini was known as “The Devil’s Violinist” for selling his soul, making Eugene borrowing his work a subtle reference.
What’s Not Working So Well:
Does this Go Together? – 2 Points
***Spoiler Alerts Here***
Crossroads mixes movie formulas. It’s a coming-of-age tale. It’s a mentor/mentee bonding film. It’s a comedy/drama/road movie.
And while you don’t feel each of these set together firm as concrete, they primarily work.
But then, before we finish, it goes fable. And that’s where the trouble is.
Tonally, through flashbacks and dream sequences, there had been hints that the supernatural would come into play.
Yet it’s still confusing that we’ve been transported to another realm.
And while Eugene plays the guitar, this was Willie’s errand. We haven’t entirely moved narratively in a firm line toward this showdown and conclusion, weakening the payoff rather than fully realizing it.
Perhaps there could have been more here to Eugene standing in for Willie — potentially as a favor to Willie rather than Eugene nonchalantly not believing Scratch is the devil or payback for the suffering of his idol, Robert Johnson, after selling his soul.
Making sure it’s Eugene’s shared motivation to win is crucial, and it feels like he’s fighting Willie’s fight for him, even if he’s in for his own soul.
Go Watch Crossroads
Total Arbitrary Points Score: 6 Points
Crossroads steps in several directions yet comes out with a product that (mostly) gets things right.
Its main characters, aided by excellent performances, develop a fun mentor/mentee banter along the way to a showdown with destiny.
This is a story of a young northerner finding his way in the south, a fledgling musician taken by the hand of an experienced pro. Together, they overcome the bumps in the road – shady bar owners, a lack of funds, flighty love interests, or the devil himself.
It doesn’t necessarily mix its fable and magic aspects convincingly with the rest of the film, but Crossroads is more than just a slide-and-shred guitar show for six-string strummers.
So give it a watch, and stay clear of that devil.
Crossroads Is rated R and directed by Walter Hill.
You can watch it for free (with ads) on YouTube or rent it from streaming sites.
You can watch the trailer here.
Disclaimer:
The factual information about the film in this review was gathered through online sources, such as Wikipedia, IMDB, or interviews. Misrepresentations and errors are possible but unintentional.
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