I'm Not There Review
by Anthony Morris
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This fractured biopic looking at the life and legend of Bob Dylan from director Todd Haynes (Velvet Goldmine, Far From Heaven)
has a lot going for it. Unfortunately, pretty much all of its good
points end up cancelling each other out, leaving behind a film that
might resonate with devoted Dylan fans... or might not, it's just too
hard to tell.
Seriously, in the type of film that's made for
fans only - and considering this film thinks Dylan is so complex an
individual (both in reality and in his own myth) that it requires six
different actors to play him you better believe that this is one for
the fans - it's still usually possible to tell when scenes and
sequences have a meaning above and beyond what's there on the screen.
Sometimes
this manages it, most notably the black & white scenes where Cate
Blanchett plays a version of Dylan in London in the 1960s. Sometimes it
doesn't, as in the scenes where Richard Gere plays a cowboy version of
Dylan mixed up with an aged version of Billy the Kid in a twisted
version of the wild west.
The real problem, and it's actually a
really big problem, is that this film makes no effort whatsoever to
persuading anyone watching that Dylan is a figure worth all this
effort. His musical history is skimmed over (though ironically, the
sequences where Dylan is played by a smart-alec pre-teen black boy
riding the rails of the American south figuring out his way into his
music are the film's most energetic) and a few references to Vietnam
aside, his place in the 60's counter-culture and folk scene is barely
sketched out.
For all Haynes' obvious skill, not to mention the
numerous fine performances and the often skilful re-creation of the
scattered periods involved, I'm Not There fails to stand up as anything more than a collection of in-jokes and coded references.
If you're planning to check this one out, do your homework beforehand. 3 out
of 5 I'm Not There
Australian release: 26th December, 2007
Cast: Cate Blanchett, Ben Whishaw, Christian Bale, Richard Gere
Director: Todd Haynes
Website: Click
here.
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