Now Streaming: Laurel Canyon - A Place in Time

Directed by Alison Ellwood, Laurel Canyon: A Place in Time, now streaming on Epix, captures the open, laid-back vibe of the mid-sixties folk/rock scene that emerged from the secluded, rustic Laurel Canyon neighborhood located just north of LA’s Sunset Strip, providing a detailed map of the friendships and rivalries that led to the formation of such iconic bands as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.

The film makes immersive use of era-defining songs like “So You Want to be a Rock & Roll Star,” by the Byrds and “California Dreamin,” by The Mamas and the Papas; extensive archival footage and photographs; and voice-over narration from key Laurel Valley players like Joni Mitchell, Roger McGuinn of the Byrds, David Crosby, Graham Nash, Jackson Browne and Bonnie Raitt, as well as on-camera commentary from photographers Henry Diltz and Nurit Wilde, who were both deeply enmeshed in the scene and documented much of it from the inside.

Laurel Canyon had all the ingredients for a creative revolution, including cheap rent, a growing community of artists and easy access to LA’s seminal performance spaces. As David Crosby says in the film, “there are periods in history when there are peaks and nobody really knows why. Paris in the thirties, the Renaissance in Italy, Los Angeles around 65, 75. Very hard to define it, but the proofs in the pudding. The music’s there.”