“ASPEN is both a city portrait and a State of the Union address, a bracing mix of cutting social satire and heartfelt Americana.”
— The Chicago Reader
“There’s diversity on display but also tension in the contrast, a sense of wildly different values living within the same area code.”
—Film Comment
“A bold study of contrasts and a bitterly funny — also sad — reflection of the concerns of the American nouveau riche.”
—Film Journal International
Frederick Wiseman’s ASPEN shows us a town that is like a two-way mirror. To tourists, it is a land of quaint shops and ski slopes. To the year-rounders — who are more often than not working-class people with a rebellious, freedom-loving streak — it is something else entirely. Newly restored.