list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around Don't Look Back on Spout Copyright 2005-9 Spout, LLC Spout RSS http://www.spout.com/images/SpoutLogoRSS.jpg http://www.spout.com/ 136 30 http://www.spout.com/films/Don_t_Look_Back/9494/default.aspx Title: Don't Look Back
Year: 2007
Director: D.A. Pennebaker
Plot: In 1965, filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker accompanied Bob Dylan to England to make a film about the singer/songwriter's British tour. At the time, no one could have known how fortuitous Pennebaker's timing would prove to be. Within a few months of this tour, Dylan would forsake his role as The Conscience of Folk Music to pick up a Fender Stratocaster and play rock and roll. Within a year, Dylan would suffer a motorcycle accident that would put him out of commission for nearly 18 months. Recording several brilliant solo performances and capturing a wealth of fly-on-the-wall footage of Dylan's interactions with friends and strangers, Pennebaker caught Dylan on the cusp of a radical career change, and the man in this film seems to be thrashing about in his shackles, looking for some sort of escape route. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 3
Number of Lists: 8
Number of blog posts: 5
SpoutRating: 4
]]>Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:00:55 GMTDon't Look Back2007D.A. PennebakerIn 1965, filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker accompanied <a href="/players/P____88557/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Bob Dylan</a> to England to make a film about the singer/songwriter's British tour. At the time, no one could have known how fortuitous Pennebaker's timing would prove to be. Within a few months of this tour, Dylan would forsake his role as The Conscience of Folk Music to pick up a Fender Stratocaster and play rock and roll. Within a year, Dylan would suffer a motorcycle accident that would put him out of commission for nearly 18 months. Recording several brilliant solo performances and capturing a wealth of fly-on-the-wall footage of Dylan's interactions with friends and strangers, Pennebaker caught Dylan on the cusp of a radical career change, and the man in this film seems to be thrashing about in his shackles, looking for some sort of escape route. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide3Slightly Tagged (1-5)854http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/u22389pkrv4.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/Don_t_Look_Back/9494/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/blogs/karina/archive/2009/1/6/39144.aspx Post By: Karina
Post To: Karina on SpoutBlog
Post Date: 1/6/2009 1:00:55 PM
Body: This post is part of a series of brief, email interviews that we’re conducting with select filmmakers who are showing work at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. All of our Sundance 2009 coverage lives here. Ry Russo-Young, whose first feature Orphans was recently released on DVD by Carnivalesque Films, makes her first trip to Sundance next week with You Won’t Miss Me. Described as a “kaleidoscopic narrative”, this New Frontiers section selection stars Stella Schnabel (daughter of Julian) and incorporates a wide variety of formats, including 16mm film and 1-chip video. You can check out the trailer at the filmmaker’s web site; her answers to The Four Questions We Ask Everyone, including praise for Steve Martin and creative Xeroxing, are below the jump. Miss Me has its premiere on Friday, January 16 at the Holiday Village. Tell us about your movie: who did you work with, what did you shoot on, why did you make it? Give us the reductive, 25-word or less, “It’s like [pop culture reference a] meets [pop culture reference b]!” pitch, then explain what the quick and dirty sell leaves out. You Won’t Miss Me is a portrait of a 23-year-old misfit recently released from a psychiatric hospital.  The lead character Shelly Brown is played by Stella Schnabel, she and I co-wrote the movie together.  I shot on five different formats to capture this character in fragments as she floats through love affairs and the earliest stages of an acting career. I guess the movie is like Don’t Look Back but in modern times. If you funded your film through a day job or through working on projects that were not your own, tell us about that. If not, tell us a story from your past work life, before you became a professional filmmaker. I mainly funded the film through grants.  While making You Won’t Miss Me I was working as a freelance editor, cutting video content for websites mainly.  I like to xerox my face because it looks cool so I was caught by a guy in the accounting department of my editing place while I was xeroxing my face, that was kind of funny and awkward. Based on your impressions of Sundance, what are you most (or maybe least) looking forward to at/regarding the festival? I keep hearing about how Sundance films are always crowded or sold out, that sounds like it could be a fun screening. I’d love to watch my movie with a full attentive audience at the festival. Let’s get hypothetical: You’re on death row. The night of your execution, you’re allowed to watch any two films of your choice. What would you pick for your last-night-on-Earth double feature? Actually, one of the first movies I thought of was an Italian film called The Tree of Wooden Clogs. It’s about very poor pesants and a little boy who’s shoe breaks.  It might help me cope with the impending execution.  That and maybe a Steve Martin movie like All of Me. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog » Karina Longworth
]]>Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:00:55 GMTKarinaKarina on SpoutBlog1/6/2009 1:00:55 PMThis post is part of a series of brief, email interviews that we’re conducting with select filmmakers who are showing work at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. All of our Sundance 2009 coverage lives here. Ry Russo-Young, whose first feature Orphans was recently released on DVD by Carnivalesque Films, makes her first trip to Sundance next week with You Won’t Miss Me. Described as a “kaleidoscopic narrative”, this New Frontiers section selection stars Stella Schnabel (daughter of Julian) and incorporates a wide variety of formats, including 16mm film and 1-chip video. You can check out the trailer at the filmmaker’s web site; her answers to The Four Questions We Ask Everyone, including praise for Steve Martin and creative Xeroxing, are below the jump. Miss Me has its premiere on Friday, January 16 at the Holiday Village. Tell us about your movie: who did you work with, what did you shoot on, why did you make it? Give us the reductive, 25-word or less, “It’s like [pop culture reference a] meets [pop culture reference b]!” pitch, then explain what the quick and dirty sell leaves out. You Won’t Miss Me is a portrait of a 23-year-old misfit recently released from a psychiatric hospital.  The lead character Shelly Brown is played by Stella Schnabel, she and I co-wrote the movie together.  I shot on five different formats to capture this character in fragments as she floats through love affairs and the earliest stages of an acting career. I guess the movie is like Don’t Look Back but in modern times. If you funded your film through a day job or through working on projects that were not your own, tell us about that. If not, tell us a story from your past work life, before you became a professional filmmaker. I mainly funded the film through grants.  While making You Won’t Miss Me I was working as a freelance editor, cutting video content for websites mainly.  I like to xerox my face because it looks cool so I was caught by a guy in the accounting department of my editing place while I was xeroxing my face, that was kind of funny and awkward. Based on your impressions of Sundance, what are you most (or maybe least) looking forward to at/regarding the festival? I keep hearing about how Sundance films are always crowded or sold out, that sounds like it could be a fun screening. I’d love to watch my movie with a full attentive audience at the festival. Let’s get hypothetical: You’re on death row. The night of your execution, you’re allowed to watch any two films of your choice. What would you pick for your last-night-on-Earth double feature? Actually, one of the first movies I thought of was an Italian film called The Tree of Wooden Clogs. It’s about very poor pesants and a little boy who’s shoe breaks.  It might help me cope with the impending execution.  That and maybe a Steve Martin movie like All of Me. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog » Karina Longworth http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2009/1/6/39143.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 1/6/2009 1:00:43 PM
Body: This post is part of a series of brief, email interviews that we’re conducting with select filmmakers who are showing work at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. All of our Sundance 2009 coverage lives here. Ry Russo-Young, whose first feature Orphans was recently released on DVD by Carnivalesque Films, makes her first trip to Sundance next week with You Won’t Miss Me. Described as a “kaleidoscopic narrative”, this New Frontiers section selection stars Stella Schnabel (daughter of Julian) and incorporates a wide variety of formats, including 16mm film and 1-chip video. You can check out the trailer at the filmmaker’s web site; her answers to The Four Questions We Ask Everyone, including praise for Steve Martin and creative Xeroxing, are below the jump. Miss Me has its premiere on Friday, January 16 at the Holiday Village. Tell us about your movie: who did you work with, what did you shoot on, why did you make it? Give us the reductive, 25-word or less, “It’s like [pop culture reference a] meets [pop culture reference b]!” pitch, then explain what the quick and dirty sell leaves out. You Won’t Miss Me is a portrait of a 23-year-old misfit recently released from a psychiatric hospital.  The lead character Shelly Brown is played by Stella Schnabel, she and I co-wrote the movie together.  I shot on five different formats to capture this character in fragments as she floats through love affairs and the earliest stages of an acting career. I guess the movie is like Don’t Look Back but in modern times. If you funded your film through a day job or through working on projects that were not your own, tell us about that. If not, tell us a story from your past work life, before you became a professional filmmaker. I mainly funded the film through grants.  While making You Won’t Miss Me I was working as a freelance editor, cutting video content for websites mainly.  I like to xerox my face because it looks cool so I was caught by a guy in the accounting department of my editing place while I was xeroxing my face, that was kind of funny and awkward. Based on your impressions of Sundance, what are you most (or maybe least) looking forward to at/regarding the festival? I keep hearing about how Sundance films are always crowded or sold out, that sounds like it could be a fun screening. I’d love to watch my movie with a full attentive audience at the festival. Let’s get hypothetical: You’re on death row. The night of your execution, you’re allowed to watch any two films of your choice. What would you pick for your last-night-on-Earth double feature? Actually, one of the first movies I thought of was an Italian film called The Tree of Wooden Clogs. It’s about very poor pesants and a little boy who’s shoe breaks.  It might help me cope with the impending execution.  That and maybe a Steve Martin movie like All of Me. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:00:43 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com1/6/2009 1:00:43 PMThis post is part of a series of brief, email interviews that we’re conducting with select filmmakers who are showing work at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. All of our Sundance 2009 coverage lives here. Ry Russo-Young, whose first feature Orphans was recently released on DVD by Carnivalesque Films, makes her first trip to Sundance next week with You Won’t Miss Me. Described as a “kaleidoscopic narrative”, this New Frontiers section selection stars Stella Schnabel (daughter of Julian) and incorporates a wide variety of formats, including 16mm film and 1-chip video. You can check out the trailer at the filmmaker’s web site; her answers to The Four Questions We Ask Everyone, including praise for Steve Martin and creative Xeroxing, are below the jump. Miss Me has its premiere on Friday, January 16 at the Holiday Village. Tell us about your movie: who did you work with, what did you shoot on, why did you make it? Give us the reductive, 25-word or less, “It’s like [pop culture reference a] meets [pop culture reference b]!” pitch, then explain what the quick and dirty sell leaves out. You Won’t Miss Me is a portrait of a 23-year-old misfit recently released from a psychiatric hospital.  The lead character Shelly Brown is played by Stella Schnabel, she and I co-wrote the movie together.  I shot on five different formats to capture this character in fragments as she floats through love affairs and the earliest stages of an acting career. I guess the movie is like Don’t Look Back but in modern times. If you funded your film through a day job or through working on projects that were not your own, tell us about that. If not, tell us a story from your past work life, before you became a professional filmmaker. I mainly funded the film through grants.  While making You Won’t Miss Me I was working as a freelance editor, cutting video content for websites mainly.  I like to xerox my face because it looks cool so I was caught by a guy in the accounting department of my editing place while I was xeroxing my face, that was kind of funny and awkward. Based on your impressions of Sundance, what are you most (or maybe least) looking forward to at/regarding the festival? I keep hearing about how Sundance films are always crowded or sold out, that sounds like it could be a fun screening. I’d love to watch my movie with a full attentive audience at the festival. Let’s get hypothetical: You’re on death row. The night of your execution, you’re allowed to watch any two films of your choice. What would you pick for your last-night-on-Earth double feature? Actually, one of the first movies I thought of was an Italian film called The Tree of Wooden Clogs. It’s about very poor pesants and a little boy who’s shoe breaks.  It might help me cope with the impending execution.  That and maybe a Steve Martin movie like All of Me. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/cinemarian/archive/2008/5/12/28578.aspx Post By: CinemaRian
Post To: CinemaRian Blog
Post Date: 5/12/2008 11:19:49 AM
Body: I have a perverse interest in watching people do dumb things when they know there on camera. There is something compelling when someone is so arrogant as to think that they can say and do whatever they want, to whoever they want, while a filmmaker is recording everything. Perhaps there is nothing that is quite as (wrongly) gratifying as watching a really, really arrogant person get put in his place. After Don't Look Back was released, Bob Dylan, who was not exactly known for good relations with the press to begin with, became a minor recluse, rarely giving interviews, and certainly never giving anyone such complete access as D.A. Pennebaker had for this movie. And with good reason- Dylan comes off as an incredibly conceded, egotistical, and mean-spirited jerk in this movie. Don't Look Back can be compared to another documentary, Overnight, with a crucial difference. Overnight documents Troy Duffey destroying his career due to his arrogance, where Dylan is already famous. This makes Dylan actually more frustrating. Surrounding himself with groupies who think he's God, Bob is free to be insult anyone he pleases, because hey, he knows the answer that's blowing in the wind. At first, you wonder if maybe Pennebaker caught the guy on a bad day, but no, this movie documents Dylan's 1965 tour of England. Some of the highlights of the tour: Dylan bullies and insults a respectful kid from a student newspaper who somehow got permission to interview him, Dylan annoys Joan Baez by typing loudly while she practices a song, Dylan gets into a shouting match because some loser in his entourage throws a glass into the street, Dylan's pig of a manager, Albert Grossman, insults pretty much everyone, and most famously, Dylan refuses to answer the questions of a Time magazine reporter because, you know, he just doesn't get the Truth, man. At the time, there was a minor (and in retrospect, stupid) controversy in Britain over whether Donovan, the "Hurdy Gurdy Man" guy, was too derivative of Bobby D. When the two finally meet, it is disturbing. Donavan is clearly in awe of Dylan and is just looking for a bit of encouragement from the master. He plays an okay song and instead of giving him a pep talk or even helpful songwriting tips, Dylan then plays a great tune, just to prove how superior he is. What an asshole. In fairness to its subject, Pennebaker does show some of the madness of fishbowl lifestyle the artist must have been living in. It also understandably that Dylan might have hard time adapting to becoming rich, famous and considered a genius at his young age (he was only 24 when the movie was made), but that doesn't excuse his lack of human decency. Pennebaker also documents a strange thing- despite the fact that Dylan likes to portray himself as being a voice of the working man, the only people he acts respectfully toward are people who will give him money or members of the aristocracy. But the movie is more than just a character portrait. It's a strange evocation of a crossroads in popular music, when it was become more sophisticated but "intellectual" folk and "mainstream" rock audiences had not yet merged. Although the film opens with a video for Dylan's first electric song, "Subterranean Homesick Blues", the tour is entirely acoustic and folk oriented. It's nice to see footage of this era of Dylan performing (he avoided television appearances) but I was never a fan of this period of his career- it always seemed a little too cerebral and preciously defiant of The Man. It's also worth nothing that few people around Dylan come off as that much better than he does. The only actual likable people in the film are other musicians: Baez, Donovan, and Alan Price, the organist of The Animals, who starts to hang out with Dylan after he leaves the group. It's not surprising that Dylan became reclusive at this film was released. If someone made that made me look this bad, I would probably never wanted to be seen on camera again. Sure, Bob Dylan was a great musician, but in terms of being a decent person, he sure ain't no Bob Geldorf. Don't Look Back (1967)
]]>Mon, 12 May 2008 15:19:49 GMTCinemaRianCinemaRian Blog5/12/2008 11:19:49 AMI have a perverse interest in watching people do dumb things when they know there on camera. There is something compelling when someone is so arrogant as to think that they can say and do whatever they want, to whoever they want, while a filmmaker is recording everything. Perhaps there is nothing that is quite as (wrongly) gratifying as watching a really, really arrogant person get put in his place. After Don't Look Back was released, Bob Dylan, who was not exactly known for good relations with the press to begin with, became a minor recluse, rarely giving interviews, and certainly never giving anyone such complete access as D.A. Pennebaker had for this movie. And with good reason- Dylan comes off as an incredibly conceded, egotistical, and mean-spirited jerk in this movie. Don't Look Back can be compared to another documentary, Overnight, with a crucial difference. Overnight documents Troy Duffey destroying his career due to his arrogance, where Dylan is already famous. This makes Dylan actually more frustrating. Surrounding himself with groupies who think he's God, Bob is free to be insult anyone he pleases, because hey, he knows the answer that's blowing in the wind. At first, you wonder if maybe Pennebaker caught the guy on a bad day, but no, this movie documents Dylan's 1965 tour of England. Some of the highlights of the tour: Dylan bullies and insults a respectful kid from a student newspaper who somehow got permission to interview him, Dylan annoys Joan Baez by typing loudly while she practices a song, Dylan gets into a shouting match because some loser in his entourage throws a glass into the street, Dylan's pig of a manager, Albert Grossman, insults pretty much everyone, and most famously, Dylan refuses to answer the questions of a Time magazine reporter because, you know, he just doesn't get the Truth, man. At the time, there was a minor (and in retrospect, stupid) controversy in Britain over whether Donovan, the "Hurdy Gurdy Man" guy, was too derivative of Bobby D. When the two finally meet, it is disturbing. Donavan is clearly in awe of Dylan and is just looking for a bit of encouragement from the master. He plays an okay song and instead of giving him a pep talk or even helpful songwriting tips, Dylan then plays a great tune, just to prove how superior he is. What an asshole. In fairness to its subject, Pennebaker does show some of the madness of fishbowl lifestyle the artist must have been living in. It also understandably that Dylan might have hard time adapting to becoming rich, famous and considered a genius at his young age (he was only 24 when the movie was made), but that doesn't excuse his lack of human decency. Pennebaker also documents a strange thing- despite the fact that Dylan likes to portray himself as being a voice of the working man, the only people he acts respectfully toward are people who will give him money or members of the aristocracy. But the movie is more than just a character portrait. It's a strange evocation of a crossroads in popular music, when it was become more sophisticated but "intellectual" folk and "mainstream" rock audiences had not yet merged. Although the film opens with a video for Dylan's first electric song, "Subterranean Homesick Blues", the tour is entirely acoustic and folk oriented. It's nice to see footage of this era of Dylan performing (he avoided television appearances) but I was never a fan of this period of his career- it always seemed a little too cerebral and preciously defiant of The Man. It's also worth nothing that few people around Dylan come off as that much better than he does. The only actual likable people in the film are other musicians: Baez, Donovan, and Alan Price, the organist of The Animals, who starts to hang out with Dylan after he leaves the group. It's not surprising that Dylan became reclusive at this film was released. If someone made that made me look this bad, I would probably never wanted to be seen on camera again. Sure, Bob Dylan was a great musician, but in terms of being a decent person, he sure ain't no Bob Geldorf. Don't Look Back (1967) http://www.spout.com/blogs/tenenbaums/archive/2007/12/2/22451.aspx Post By: Tenenbaums
Post To: Tenenbaums Blog
Post Date: 12/2/2007 1:27:40 AM
Body: Bob Dylan has led an eventful life. He’s redefined the protest song, influenced the Beatles, found God, and won an Oscar. The nation’s reigning poet laureate continues to make great music and tour nearly 50 years after his rise to the top of the folk scene. His story is legendary and inspiring. But is it cinematic?The real-life Dylan is. D.A. Pennebaker’s Don’t Look Back and Martin Scorsese’s No Direction Home are towering documentaries chronicling the 1965 British tour and Dylan’s life up until his motorcycle wreck, respectively. That Dylan is charming, mysterious, and inspiring. He is as close to a musical superhero as anyone has come, including Elvis.But what about the fictional Dylan? Being a natural storyteller, Dylan seemed fit as any to explore himself on a deeper level. For someone who has successfully dodged the press’ attempts to explain his entire being, surely the man himself could provide the best insight.Unfortunately, existing evidence suggests that he cannot. The role-playing portion of his Renaldo and Clara is widely considered a failure. Then there is the shameful vanity project, Masked and Anonymous. Co-written with director Larry Charles, under the not-so-clever pseudonym Sergei Petrov, Dylan plays a version of himself called Jack Fate. Set against a war-torn future America that resembles Havana meshed with the Bronx, the all-star casts speaks incoherent “poetry” while Dylan poker faces through and endless series of meaningless scenes.The film is intended to play out like one of Dylan’s more complex songs, such as “Gates of Eden” or “Desolation Row.” Instead, it is reminiscent of a Dylan version of a Bad Hemingway contest, except it’s written by Dylan.Dylan told Charles not to worry about initial response to the film but to wait for the long-term appreciation. Unless there is a second film decodable with 3-D glasses and playing the audio backwards, that day will never come. Only the most insane Dylan disciples, bereft with multiple mental illnesses, will be able to find value in the effort. The only sliver of redemption is Dylan’s cover of “Dixie,” and it can thankfully be viewed on YouTube, far from the rest of the failure.Only when Dylan himself isn’t involved in the abstraction does the end result work. I’m Not There, the new film from Todd Haynes, is “inspired by the music and many lives of Bob Dylan” and works hard to combine the fantastic and the real. Haynes breaks Dylan’s life into six vignettes played by six different people. The concept is ambitious, but entirely sensible as each distinct chapter is true to its respective Dylan reinvention.There’s a 10-year-old black boy full of tall tales who thinks he’s Woody Guthrie (Marcus Carl Franklin); a young 20something Greenwich Village folk music phenomenon named Jack Rollins (Christian Bale); a poet calling himself Arthur Rimbaud who is under some sort of government subcommittee interrogation (Ben Whishaw); a famous actor who portrayed Rollins in a corny biopic, now witnessing his marriage fall apart (Heath Ledger, whose character Robbie Clark’s personality may have split from or become bonded to the folk hero’s during filming); Jude Quinn, a former folk star, fresh off bewildering his listeners by going electric, on a media-frenzied tour of England (Cate Blanchett); and a middle-aged Billy the Kid, who evaded death and now lives in careful seclusion (Richard Gere). None of them are Dylan, yet they could be no one else.In many moments, the film drags and ventures into Lynchian depths of artistic drudgery. But when it soars, it reaches seemingly unparalleled heights, thanks to the music and personal connections with Dylan lore. Similar to previous experimental Dylan explorations, it is an immense help to know the legend. Fortunately, for the undefined audience of Haynes’ film, the tidbits here are much more accessible: visits to a dying Woody Guthrie in his New Jersey hospital room; Newport Folk Festival lore coming alive as a Pete Seeger stand-in attempts to slice the electric guitars’ power source with an axe; disillusioned festival onlookers precisely quoting Don’t Look Back‘s equally mystified British youth; Quinn passing along his uppers and downers to the Beatles; and the Rolling Thunder Revue inspired landscape of the Gere scenes and his Basement Tapes era Billy.By being aware of the scattered facts we can be in on the joke, and yet it is our supposed knowledge that is being toyed with throughout the film. We don’t know Dylan. We’ve never really known him and that’s how things should be. The same message should also be applied to each viewer: Do we want all of our moves to be scrutinized by the public? How silly can “celebrity” be? How can every man find peace and happiness in the face of constant scrutiny? In the end, the music is the star. Let the man be.Fellini’s self-reflexivity and personal criticism of 8 1/2 is constant throughout the film and receives an exclamation point with a balloon-like Quinn threatening to fly away if not for a rope around his ankle. But it’s Haynes, not Dylan, who makes these private pronouncements on behalf of the artist, adding another curious level to I’m Not There’s mystery. The writer-director has immersed himself in Dylanology, but combines the knowledge with his film-smarts to make the piece work. It takes a real filmmaker like Haynes to do it right and Dylan’s necessary absence lends deeper meaning to the project’s title and success.And yet he is there, if only in spirit and recorded sound. But what a strong, strange presence it is! As a result, the known Dylans connect quickest. Franklin’s Woody encompasses the unbelievable stories Dylan told after his arrival in New York City; Bale’s Rollins perfectly mimes the young Dylan, slowly bouncing with sincerity while singing for justice and equality for all; Whishaw’s quasi-narrator streams familiar quips in defense of himself and his art; and Blanchett plays “Ballad of a Thin Man” with the identical head nods and floppy piano wrists from the famous ’65 footage while confounding reporters to our delight in other scenes.The unknown Dylans (beginning chronologically with Ledger) are the most difficult to follow, yet they encompass his most painful elements. These fractions are a man picking up the pieces from the press’ strangulation and a horrific motorcycle wreck. Temporary hermitage may have helped, but the problems are too large to easily repair. One potential path to healing is religion, and Bale’s reborn Pastor John perfectly hyperbolizes the evangelical Dylan, one of the artist’s most confusing and complex periods. When he sings “Pressing On” to a small rec-room congregation, the pain is all but absent and his faith and joy resonate.Then there are the Gere scenes, the film’s most cryptic, though also deserving of more time. The Rolling Thunder Revue period is a fascinating Dylan tangent of circus, troubadours, whiteface, and collaboration. The setting is there, complete with giraffes and sideshow attractions, but the experiences are not. The closest we get is Jim James, the My Morning Jacket lead singer, dressed in RTR Dylan garb and singing “Goin’ to Acapulco” for a funeral wake. The reclusive Dylan clearly chose to hide here, but the excursion was far too brief and mysterious. Perhaps that’s how it should be. Only Dylan knows, but Haynes convinces us that he too is privy to that knowledge.I’m Not There is a wandering, magical meditation on the most influential musician of our time and will require multiple views to process its plentiful messages. It may be the most intelligent musical ever made and the layered ambiguity in which it is presented finally accomplishes what Dylan himself has yet to do.
]]>Sun, 02 Dec 2007 06:27:40 GMTTenenbaumsTenenbaums Blog12/2/2007 1:27:40 AMBob Dylan has led an eventful life. He&rsquo;s redefined the protest song, influenced the Beatles, found God, and won an Oscar. The nation&rsquo;s reigning poet laureate continues to make great music and tour nearly 50 years after his rise to the top of the folk scene. His story is legendary and inspiring. But is it cinematic?The real-life Dylan is. D.A. Pennebaker&rsquo;s Don&rsquo;t Look Back and Martin Scorsese&rsquo;s No Direction Home are towering documentaries chronicling the 1965 British tour and Dylan&rsquo;s life up until his motorcycle wreck, respectively. That Dylan is charming, mysterious, and inspiring. He is as close to a musical superhero as anyone has come, including Elvis.But what about the fictional Dylan? Being a natural storyteller, Dylan seemed fit as any to explore himself on a deeper level. For someone who has successfully dodged the press&rsquo; attempts to explain his entire being, surely the man himself could provide the best insight.Unfortunately, existing evidence suggests that he cannot. The role-playing portion of his Renaldo and Clara is widely considered a failure. Then there is the shameful vanity project, Masked and Anonymous. Co-written with director Larry Charles, under the not-so-clever pseudonym Sergei Petrov, Dylan plays a version of himself called Jack Fate. Set against a war-torn future America that resembles Havana meshed with the Bronx, the all-star casts speaks incoherent &ldquo;poetry&rdquo; while Dylan poker faces through and endless series of meaningless scenes.The film is intended to play out like one of Dylan&rsquo;s more complex songs, such as &ldquo;Gates of Eden&rdquo; or &ldquo;Desolation Row.&rdquo; Instead, it is reminiscent of a Dylan version of a Bad Hemingway contest, except it&rsquo;s written by Dylan.Dylan told Charles not to worry about initial response to the film but to wait for the long-term appreciation. Unless there is a second film decodable with 3-D glasses and playing the audio backwards, that day will never come. Only the most insane Dylan disciples, bereft with multiple mental illnesses, will be able to find value in the effort. The only sliver of redemption is Dylan&rsquo;s cover of &ldquo;Dixie,&rdquo; and it can thankfully be viewed on YouTube, far from the rest of the failure.Only when Dylan himself isn&rsquo;t involved in the abstraction does the end result work. I&rsquo;m Not There, the new film from Todd Haynes, is &ldquo;inspired by the music and many lives of Bob Dylan&rdquo; and works hard to combine the fantastic and the real. Haynes breaks Dylan&rsquo;s life into six vignettes played by six different people. The concept is ambitious, but entirely sensible as each distinct chapter is true to its respective Dylan reinvention.There&rsquo;s a 10-year-old black boy full of tall tales who thinks he&rsquo;s Woody Guthrie (Marcus Carl Franklin); a young 20something Greenwich Village folk music phenomenon named Jack Rollins (Christian Bale); a poet calling himself Arthur Rimbaud who is under some sort of government subcommittee interrogation (Ben Whishaw); a famous actor who portrayed Rollins in a corny biopic, now witnessing his marriage fall apart (Heath Ledger, whose character Robbie Clark&rsquo;s personality may have split from or become bonded to the folk hero&rsquo;s during filming); Jude Quinn, a former folk star, fresh off bewildering his listeners by going electric, on a media-frenzied tour of England (Cate Blanchett); and a middle-aged Billy the Kid, who evaded death and now lives in careful seclusion (Richard Gere). None of them are Dylan, yet they could be no one else.In many moments, the film drags and ventures into Lynchian depths of artistic drudgery. But when it soars, it reaches seemingly unparalleled heights, thanks to the music and personal connections with Dylan lore. Similar to previous experimental Dylan explorations, it is an immense help to know the legend. Fortunately, for the undefined audience of Haynes&rsquo; film, the tidbits here are much more accessible: visits to a dying Woody Guthrie in his New Jersey hospital room; Newport Folk Festival lore coming alive as a Pete Seeger stand-in attempts to slice the electric guitars&rsquo; power source with an axe; disillusioned festival onlookers precisely quoting Don&rsquo;t Look Back&lsquo;s equally mystified British youth; Quinn passing along his uppers and downers to the Beatles; and the Rolling Thunder Revue inspired landscape of the Gere scenes and his Basement Tapes era Billy.By being aware of the scattered facts we can be in on the joke, and yet it is our supposed knowledge that is being toyed with throughout the film. We don&rsquo;t know Dylan. We&rsquo;ve never really known him and that&rsquo;s how things should be. The same message should also be applied to each viewer: Do we want all of our moves to be scrutinized by the public? How silly can &ldquo;celebrity&rdquo; be? How can every man find peace and happiness in the face of constant scrutiny? In the end, the music is the star. Let the man be.Fellini&rsquo;s self-reflexivity and personal criticism of 8 1/2 is constant throughout the film and receives an exclamation point with a balloon-like Quinn threatening to fly away if not for a rope around his ankle. But it&rsquo;s Haynes, not Dylan, who makes these private pronouncements on behalf of the artist, adding another curious level to I&rsquo;m Not There&rsquo;s mystery. The writer-director has immersed himself in Dylanology, but combines the knowledge with his film-smarts to make the piece work. It takes a real filmmaker like Haynes to do it right and Dylan&rsquo;s necessary absence lends deeper meaning to the project&rsquo;s title and success.And yet he is there, if only in spirit and recorded sound. But what a strong, strange presence it is! As a result, the known Dylans connect quickest. Franklin&rsquo;s Woody encompasses the unbelievable stories Dylan told after his arrival in New York City; Bale&rsquo;s Rollins perfectly mimes the young Dylan, slowly bouncing with sincerity while singing for justice and equality for all; Whishaw&rsquo;s quasi-narrator streams familiar quips in defense of himself and his art; and Blanchett plays &ldquo;Ballad of a Thin Man&rdquo; with the identical head nods and floppy piano wrists from the famous &rsquo;65 footage while confounding reporters to our delight in other scenes.The unknown Dylans (beginning chronologically with Ledger) are the most difficult to follow, yet they encompass his most painful elements. These fractions are a man picking up the pieces from the press&rsquo; strangulation and a horrific motorcycle wreck. Temporary hermitage may have helped, but the problems are too large to easily repair. One potential path to healing is religion, and Bale&rsquo;s reborn Pastor John perfectly hyperbolizes the evangelical Dylan, one of the artist&rsquo;s most confusing and complex periods. When he sings &ldquo;Pressing On&rdquo; to a small rec-room congregation, the pain is all but absent and his faith and joy resonate.Then there are the Gere scenes, the film&rsquo;s most cryptic, though also deserving of more time. The Rolling Thunder Revue period is a fascinating Dylan tangent of circus, troubadours, whiteface, and collaboration. The setting is there, complete with giraffes and sideshow attractions, but the experiences are not. The closest we get is Jim James, the My Morning Jacket lead singer, dressed in RTR Dylan garb and singing &ldquo;Goin&rsquo; to Acapulco&rdquo; for a funeral wake. The reclusive Dylan clearly chose to hide here, but the excursion was far too brief and mysterious. Perhaps that&rsquo;s how it should be. Only Dylan knows, but Haynes convinces us that he too is privy to that knowledge.I&rsquo;m Not There is a wandering, magical meditation on the most influential musician of our time and will require multiple views to process its plentiful messages. It may be the most intelligent musical ever made and the layered ambiguity in which it is presented finally accomplishes what Dylan himself has yet to do. http://www.spout.com/blogs/tenenbaums/archive/2007/7/25/15892.aspx Post By: Tenenbaums
Post To: Tenenbaums Blog
Post Date: 7/25/2007 1:19:00 AM
Body: Within an hour last April in Durham, I sat within ten feet of both Gary Gaetti and D.A. Pennebaker. They might as well be former college roommates.Gaetti is currently an assistant coach for the Durham Bulls. I saw the familiar name (he's a substitute on my beloved Parker Brothers' Electronic Baseball) but his neck was so tan that I thought he was black. Then he gave the first base line his profile and I saw the schnoz. It was the real deal.Pennebaker was in town promoting his new film Bob Dylan: 65 Revisited at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. The upstairs Cinema One at the Carolina Theatre was mostly full by the time I got my will call ticket, but attending alone warranted an end seat on the second row. Four seats over from me in the front row sat an older fellow who was napping with his head straight up. A festival photographer knelt in front of me next to the stairs and snapped a few shots of a group of three ladies standing next to the stage. I wondered where Pennebaker would enter.The middle lady then went to the mic and said that Pennebaker literally needed "no introduction" since he had been a regular attendee and friend of the festival for its entire ten year run. She then gave the floor up to "Penny," and the man who had been temporarily resting his eyes walked to the stage.The film is a new one hour documentary culled from extra footage from Pennebaker's wonderful Don't Look Back. He claimed that he intended to name the new film "Outtakes," but was vetoed by other decision makers. While going over the entirety of his Dylan reels, Pennebaker was especially moved by full length performances of songs over four decades old. In making this new film, he wanted to highlight "half a dozen or so" of the tunes in their entirety and surround them with additional entertaining footage.And it is highly entertaining. Another element of that hour was also entertaining, though in a confusing way. "If You've Got to Go, Go Now (Or Else You've Got to Stay All Night)" is a funny song and I laughed the first few times I heard it before settling into a permanent grin when it is played. But the song is over 40 years old. People know it, right?When the largely middle-aged hipster audience heard the song and its multiple punchlines, they exploded with laughter as if they were hearing Eddie Murphy's Raw for the first time. Listening to these howls, I began to re-think my approach to comedy in repeated form. Since I laugh every time I hear "There will be no fighting in the war room!" from Dr. Strangelove, should I respond similarly to this song or do I need to adopt an Amish line of defense? How funny is Borat the fifth or fiftieth time around?But then another possibility emerged. Attendees at any kind of film festival, especially one featuring documentaries, are rarely knowledgeable about the subject(s) that they see on screen. Could the audience around me also be ignorant about such an iconic figure as Dylan? Apparently so. Here was a song that was released during most ticket-holders' primes, yet it had somehow eluded them.The Q&A that followed consisted of four brief laudatory questions, converted to enlightening insider information by Pennebaker. As a master in his field, he had a lot to share, as I am sure was the case for Michael Moore and Ross McElwee, who had later festival screenings. Rumor also spread that Scorsese made an appearance, though I also heard that he only contributed a video introduction to a doc that he "presented."So, be on the lookout for Gaetti at the Southpoint Mall food court and feel free to laugh hard at your fuzzy VHS copy of Mallrats. He's hungry, and some of your friends in the room might not know about Jay and Silent Bob.
]]>Wed, 25 Jul 2007 05:19:00 GMTTenenbaumsTenenbaums Blog7/25/2007 1:19:00 AMWithin an hour last April in Durham, I sat within ten feet of both Gary Gaetti and D.A. Pennebaker. They might as well be former college roommates.Gaetti is currently an assistant coach for the Durham Bulls. I saw the familiar name (he&#39;s a substitute on my beloved Parker Brothers&#39; Electronic Baseball) but his neck was so tan that I thought he was black. Then he gave the first base line his profile and I saw the schnoz. It was the real deal.Pennebaker was in town promoting his new film Bob Dylan: 65 Revisited at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. The upstairs Cinema One at the Carolina Theatre was mostly full by the time I got my will call ticket, but attending alone warranted an end seat on the second row. Four seats over from me in the front row sat an older fellow who was napping with his head straight up. A festival photographer knelt in front of me next to the stairs and snapped a few shots of a group of three ladies standing next to the stage. I wondered where Pennebaker would enter.The middle lady then went to the mic and said that Pennebaker literally needed &quot;no introduction&quot; since he had been a regular attendee and friend of the festival for its entire ten year run. She then gave the floor up to &quot;Penny,&quot; and the man who had been temporarily resting his eyes walked to the stage.The film is a new one hour documentary culled from extra footage from Pennebaker&#39;s wonderful Don&#39;t Look Back. He claimed that he intended to name the new film &quot;Outtakes,&quot; but was vetoed by other decision makers. While going over the entirety of his Dylan reels, Pennebaker was especially moved by full length performances of songs over four decades old. In making this new film, he wanted to highlight &quot;half a dozen or so&quot; of the tunes in their entirety and surround them with additional entertaining footage.And it is highly entertaining. Another element of that hour was also entertaining, though in a confusing way. &quot;If You&#39;ve Got to Go, Go Now (Or Else You&#39;ve Got to Stay All Night)&quot; is a funny song and I laughed the first few times I heard it before settling into a permanent grin when it is played. But the song is over 40 years old. People know it, right?When the largely middle-aged hipster audience heard the song and its multiple punchlines, they exploded with laughter as if they were hearing Eddie Murphy&#39;s Raw for the first time. Listening to these howls, I began to re-think my approach to comedy in repeated form. Since I laugh every time I hear &quot;There will be no fighting in the war room!&quot; from Dr. Strangelove, should I respond similarly to this song or do I need to adopt an Amish line of defense? How funny is Borat the fifth or fiftieth time around?But then another possibility emerged. Attendees at any kind of film festival, especially one featuring documentaries, are rarely knowledgeable about the subject(s) that they see on screen. Could the audience around me also be ignorant about such an iconic figure as Dylan? Apparently so. Here was a song that was released during most ticket-holders&#39; primes, yet it had somehow eluded them.The Q&amp;A that followed consisted of four brief laudatory questions, converted to enlightening insider information by Pennebaker. As a master in his field, he had a lot to share, as I am sure was the case for Michael Moore and Ross McElwee, who had later festival screenings. Rumor also spread that Scorsese made an appearance, though I also heard that he only contributed a video introduction to a doc that he &quot;presented.&quot;So, be on the lookout for Gaetti at the Southpoint Mall food court and feel free to laugh hard at your fuzzy VHS copy of Mallrats. He&#39;s hungry, and some of your friends in the room might not know about Jay and Silent Bob. http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/documentary/MemberTagFilms.aspxdocumentary
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