Wednesday, April 30, 2008

I'M NOT THERE (4 STARS)

Todd Haynes totally dropped the ball on this Bob Dylan biopic... for the most part. He has a lot of good ideas, but they're overshadowed by bad ones. If you didn't already know, this movie represents different aspects of Bob Dylan's life. Different phases he went threw. It sounds radical but really, it's just another biopic. What this biopic does that is really stupid and pointless is it takes shots, scenes, dialogues, and characters from documentaries that every Dylan fan has seen thousands of times, and makes a movie out of them. Don't you think we'd want to see those scenes actually acted out by Bob Dylan himself other than someone else doing it poorly. A little more than half of this movie is a TOTAL JOKE!!!!!!
I'm irate with anger when watching this movie. It would be SO easy to just write original dialogue for the character, and an original narrative based on what we know. Haynes not only based the scenes on what actually happened, he based them shot for shot on what we've already seen in; Don't look back, no direction home, and Eat the document.

There are 6 actors portraying different aspects of Dylan's life.

A little black kid represents the young, wide eyed Dylan, 59', 60', 61'. Who would tell people different names and told them he was from different places. Who idolized Woody Guthrie and old blues singers. Talked about traveling and being on the road. He calls himself Woody Guthrie. It's a great idea... perfect way to start the movie. Then the dialogue comes in. The acting is awful. This kid is saying the most ridicules things. He sings a few times and it's so cheesy and awful. Really early on in the movie he's singing Tombstone Blues with some other "black folk" on a porch. I wanted to punch my fist threw the TV screen. The scenes would go on and on with no point or nothing interesting happening and stupid dialogue and then someone would say something that makes since to the story and i'd think, "oh, that's what this whole scene was about, that one stinkin' line". I got nothing against a little black kid playing a young Dylan but it stunk. It really cheesed out the movie. I think a 20 something kid could do something better. Mostly a kid who can actually play the guitar and sing and has some kind of concept of what the blues are. HOWEVER... he wasn't the worse part.

Christian Bale
plays the protest era Dylan, 62', 63', 64'. THIS>>> WAS THE WORST PART! Every SECOND of Bale's performance was terrible. I'm a HUGE Christian Bale fan... HUGE. But this was a darn right TERRIBLE idea on Haynes' part. He's playing the most obnoxious Dylan impression ever. He sings all wrong. He plays all wrong. He lurks around when he walks and mumbles and talks fast. The worst part about his roll is that it's all set as a documentary. The scenes he's in are set as archive footage that is in the middle of a documentary about him. There's interviews with people including Julian Moore who's obviously playing Joan Baez because of her wittiness. She's saying the same things as Baez from No Direction Home. IT'S SO STUPID because they're re-enacting a documentary that everyone has seen. WHY!?!?!? The whole Christian Bale part is all stuff we've seen before...the union civil rights thing out in the field, the speech if front of the left wingers, the interviews. Neither the kid or him had a quarter of the balls in their singing as Dylan. I'm not saying they need to sound like him... i'm saying they should put out the message in the style he had... at leased. Why would Bale want to sing in that drony, mellow, pretty boy voice? You know he probably put a lot of thought into it.
Oh GOSH! and when he plays the "religious Dylan" it's so bad! It's a freakin joke!!! why would they do that?!! It's SO awful!

Cate Blanchett plays the mid 60's Dylan, 65' and 66. "The electric Dylan". Again, this part replays scenes from other documentaries. At least it's not played AS a documentary. It also changes things around a little. It does this annoying thing and tries to cram multiple events from documentaries into one scene. I'm telling ya, for a guy like me who's seen Don't Look Back, and No direction Home hundreds of times... it's nerve racking! Towards the end of the movie, it goes it's own direction. And during that time, i really enjoy watching it. It still looks black and white and grainy and looks like Don't look back but i'm seeing other things happening. Then Haynes starts throwing in other director influences like Fellini and Godard. French New Wave styles and abstract thoughts come flying at you in a long montage. It's get really good actually. Haynes explores the song MR JONES, using a character from Don't Look back and really dives into the lyrics of the song and throws in some amazing imagery!
Blanchett made me uncomfortable most of the time. She has boobs. I can see them. I've thought in the past that i would "DO" Bob Dylan if i had the chance, but now that Bob Dylan is a hot woman.... i'm a little turned off. It's weird seeing her walk around. And a one point she draws a mustache on her face and it gets even weirder.
Over all the Blanchett part was tolerable, annoying, and beautiful.

Ben Whishaw was my favorite of the Dylan impersonators. He was SOOO good. I've only seen him in the movie Perfume and he blew me away THEN. He's just really cool. I don't doubt for a second he's not a badass when i see him smoking a cigarette and resiting Dylan-esk thoughts. There's not much of him, but what there is... is great. I wish he had his one story. I bet Haynes regretted only having him do that one part once he saw how good he was and how BAD Bale was.


Heath Ledger plays a celebrity actor who meets a French panter played by Charlotte Gainsbourg representing Dylan and his family life in the 60's and 70's. This is no lie... for the last 2 years, my wife and i have casted who would play us in our true life story. It has always been Heath Ledger and Charlotte Gainsbourg. WE LOVE BOTH OF THEM!!! When we found out they were going to be husband and wife in a movie... and playing Dylan and Sara!!!!??? We freaked. i would have been more bummed about their part not being good more than any other. But let me tell ya..... was was not disappointed. I was awestruck! I was bug eyed, mouth open awestruck about how BEAUTIFUL their part was. It looked amazing. The acting was amazing. Haynes took the most interesting parts of Godard films to put them in there. He uses the most interesting background elements to portray thoughts. He uses media to tell the story, symbolically and literally. She was so cool... he was so cool. There was nothing stolen from any Dylan film. It was just based on Dylan's story. It was SO good. I wish Haynes could just make a movie about THEM.

And then there's Richard Gere playing old Dylan. Again... really good idea. He's a recluse. Seeming to be in the old west. Has a dog, a horse, and a shotgun. Lives in a shack. But the cool part about the story is he's Billy the kid in hiding. He used to be an outlaw and now he's just laying low out of the lime light. Really cool imagery and symbolism. However, it seems thrown together pretty terribly. He sets look like cardboard. The whole thing reminds me of the history channel, when there's a narrator talking about what happened to this guy in this one time and then it cuts to the guy wearing cheesy clothes and hes walking threw town and everyone in the town looks stupid and it's all obviously fake. I suppose it's supposed to look like that. It has a circus like feeling to it as does many parts of this movie. Dylan does refer the circus elements a lot in his book and in his songs. George Washington black face and a giraffe. Also a L.P. saying, "Good morning Mr Gladstone".

I really liked Gere's part. It had a lot of references in it. A lot of hidden messages. It also cuts back to the other characters showing his reflection on his past. It's really good and emotional.

Over all it's hard to say. There's stuff i really hate, and there's stuff i really like. However you really can't beat the soundtrack. Haynes must of had a hay day with every Dylan song at his fingertips. He DID chose just the right songs for the right moments.

So, if you're a Dylan fan, watch it for everything good i've written about. And if you're not a Dylan fan... you can watch it for all the strange director references. Or a little Dylan education. However you'll probably just be really confused.

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