It is the summer of 1969 and struggling singer-songwriters and best friends Lorian (Willow Shields) and Meryl (Meg DeLacy) are floundering playing gigs for poorly attended birthday parties. When they stumble upon a poster for the Woodstock music festival they start planning fundraising ideas and a road trip that will take them to their dreams.

On the face of it Woodstock or Bust is a road trip movie where the friendship of two 17 year old girls is challenged and reinforced whilst they face a series of vignettes on their way. But it seems the political backdrop of 1969 is the key issue for the film makers with a strong anti-war message. The film opens with a credit sequence inside a lava lamp that shows archive images of the festival as well as the key political figures and events of the era such as JFK, Martin Luther King and the Vietnam War. Unfortunately though this political facet never really seemed to click. The most interesting part of the film is the friendship between Lorian and Meryl, but given that the film is not overtly a comedy or a coming of age feature neither of their characters seem to grow and the political and social circumstances do not seem to have an impact on them either. The result is a film hamstrung by a lack of dramatic impetus.

In terms of the creative input to the film it is a female led film. Written by Judi Blaze and Leslie Bloom, who also directs in their debut feature film and featuring a score by Blair Borland and original songs by Michele Curtis Purvance. But the stand outs are the two leads. Willow Shields will probably be best known as Primrose from the Hunger Games whilst Meg DeLacy is appearing in the upcoming DC Stargirl series.

Overall though it seems to fall between stalls. None of the vignettes stand out and the film is neither dramatic enough, comedic enough or political enough to be more than a mildly diverting 90 minutes.