Cate Blanchett to play Bob Dylan in an upcoming film.

“I’m Not There” is bravely conceived, but some of the reconstructions of the folk movement could have come straight out of “A Mighty Wind,”

Anthony Lane OTM^^

I watched "Eat the Document" a couple night ago, and can confirm it takes place during the 1966 European tour (part acoustic, part electric, as on Bootleg Series vol 4). The movie is bewildering. Dylan is disoriented throughout, except when on stage when he + the Hawks are in top form. The footage is very shaky; if this is Pennebaker, a lot of editing would have had to happen before release. There's a great scene with Johnny Cash looking more druggy than Dylan. Obv. the taxi ride with Lennon is a big deal, although like "Cocksucker Blues" way more boring than the hype would suggest.

guy who gets involved w/ her and makes Blanchett jealous = ? anyone in particular?

loosely based on Bob Neuwirth, maybe? Not that he & Dylan passed around Edie Sedgwick, but rather as his companion during the '65 tour.

The third weekend, the Weinsteins almost tripled the number of theaters -- and the total gross went down by a third: $920 per screen.

So no, this is not gonna cross over (surprise).

it doesn't make any sense backloading quality releases into the last two-three months of the year. is it the public's fault for giving a fuck about awards, or the academy members who can only remember films they seen/had hyped to them from six weeks before voting?

There's plenty of circular short-attention-span credit to go around.

INT would do about as "well" at the b.o. in any season, though.

i planned to see this tonite but it quit showing last night. :(

the idea that this was ever gonna be a hit is pretty absurd. even among my art-film friends some of them aren't going because they don't like dylan, and a lot of my dylan-fan friends aren't going because they think todd haynes is up to something sneaky and they don't like the idea of it. the natural constituency of the movie is pretty small.

(but as a member of that small constituency, i'm glad haynes got to make his movie.)

'65 UK was his last acoustic tour, I think. "Subterranean" had just been released as a single, the album wasn't out yet.

-- Dr Morbius, Thursday, November 29, 2007 9:02 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Link

yes. tho maybe the album was out? i think they play a copy of it in dont look back but maybe it's a dubplate? the tour was in april-may. also although he played an electric guitar at newport in 1965, the 1966 UK tour was a lot... more electric.

xpost

this has had great reviews and i would have expected a pretty large urban-area hit. as with mid-60s dylan, maybe it'll do better in the uk lol.

lot of my dylan-fan friends aren't going because they think todd haynes is up to something sneaky and they don't like the idea of it

my thoughts exactly!

I've talked to some people who found it quite boring. Someone told a story of going with his girlfriend - she fell asleep, so he woke her up and said, "If you're not watching it, can we leave?"

'65 UK was his last acoustic tour, I think. "Subterranean" had just been released as a single, the album wasn't out yet.

-- Dr Morbius, Thursday, November 29, 2007 9:02 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Link

yes. tho maybe the album was out? i think they play a copy of it in dont look back but maybe it's a dubplate? the tour was in april-may.

I thought DLB was released in '67 (I think I saw that copyright date on my DVD), so Pennebaker would have plenty of time to add the "Subterranean" video.

they shot the subterranean video in '65 in london, same time as the rest of the doc. that song was definitely out there, question is, was the album? i think it was.

9 Bob Dylan Subterranean Homesick Blues Single Apr 1965
1 Bob Dylan Bringing It All Back Home Album May 1965

So, yeah.

surprisingly, i liked this movie more than i thought, the Blanchett-fellini style part and charlot ginsbourg godard meets sirk parts are the genius,master picks of this great movie.
my friend was bored,though.

one of the great directing elements here, is the fact that dylan is, in lots of parts, alone on one side of the frame,while on the other side- bunch of people in line looking at him,amazed.he is always individual,always performong,even if he is not intending to.
the individual vs. society and the 60's cinema influences works great together.
and the focus mostly on the 60's years is crucial, thinking about that period as the crisis bridge in america between conservative society suddenly embracing individualism .
the crisis that goes on till present i guess.

girls dressed as boys can be a cool aesthetic, less of a cliche than the other way around.

this film looks like a load of record collectin' mojo readin' bollox to me tho.

http://i16.tinypic.com/6x7fm38.jpg

btw, it appears that this is the last night that this is playing on a screen larger than the Film Forum's in NYC -- and it needs to be seen big -- ao I'm headed for Loews 19th St for a second viewing.

Y'know I didn't want to overpraise this movie just because so many boneheaded people find it incredibly demanding (and it's just not that demanding unless your only yardstick is "Air Bud", I mean people who can handle "Last Year At Marienbad" are not going to break a sweat here) . . . but I do need to say in this movie's defense that, even though it's a mess, it stays with you for a long time afterwards. I felt it really lingered in the mind; it's not *just* bricolage, there's a real emotional impact that it transmits, and Blanchett's performance is the reason.

is is a mess, but in a good way.
like fellini and godard were "mess" in the 60's.
the best parts of the films are tributes to those directors style.
in this case the good thing is also the bad : imitation.a great one though ,but still .

Drew is right, there is, perhaps ironically, some real emotion communicated. I even found the last shot strangely moving. there's a nice balancing act between the bricolage and semiotic play and the real honest to goodness attempts at meaning. (as if the process of signification could accomplish anything else!)

Irony and emotion don't always cancel each other out.

I forgot how funny this was, probably more LOLs than anything this year except The Simpsons Movie (like the Brian Jones "cover band" line.)

The only part that seems most like a "mess" (which I wouldn't often use to describe Fellini, and probably never Godard -- even his bad films seem rigorous) is still Gere/Billy, but I even liked that more this time.

Also think there was a 2001 HAL 9000-lip-reading ref at the start.

the Brian Jones cover band line was LOL

what i meant is that they were/are "mess" only to the untamed eyes

Just watched it. Ya know, the Gere parts really reminded me of a Burton film (like Big Fish, maybe) and maybe they are both going back to something else. The movie star Dylan (was that Heath?) was the only personification of Dylan that seemed inconsistent with my beliefs about Dylan (which isn't to say it was less 'authentic,' just that is was more shocking to me). Loved Blanchett, loved Bale.

Jesus it's really long though. I had to watch it in two sittings (with few minute breaks throughout), else I probably wouldn't be able to make it through the whole thing. Oh, and I hated the Charlotte Ginsburg character (is that her real accent?).

(My complaint about the length isn't too say it's too much - just to say it's very, very demanding. At least, was to me.)

really zoomed by for me. Southland Tales, THAT was long.

C.G. is French, yes (not to mention the daughter of a movie star and pop star).

The movie star Dylan (was that Heath?) was the only personification of Dylan that seemed inconsistent with my beliefs about Dylan

You mean his being 'a bad husband'? It seems to be the scholarly consensus.

That's such a strange thing, Mordechai. The Ledger section matches what we know about Dylan's breadbaking years in Woodstock.

I didn't mean the facts so much as the feeling of it. He didn't "seem" like any Dylan I was familiar with.

I would put that down to it being the "private"/assholish Dylan

film o' the year

Err, yeah. No question (much as I loved Into The Wild). I had no idea it was going to be that good. I had no idea a film *could* be that good, technically, at least. But it wasn't just the technique. Wow, I am still reeling.

Also, are there any Fellini or Godard films that are actually as good as Haynes's homage here? I think I might have to reinvestigate. I am excited!

the masculin-feminin ref a++

Would anyone help to seed the torrent of an Eat The Document DVD from here?

the 2+ gig one?

fuck it, i'm in.

Yeah, there were about 3 seeds and I've got about 10% of it, but it's down to one at the moment.

my connection is slow right now but i'm on it.

Ta, I didn't think it had ever been released on DVD, so maybe this is actually no better quality than the vcd version I'm also dling, but it's worth a go.

it's never had an official release nah.

Humph. It all downloaded but I'm damned if I can make it work.

uh yeah it's been looking all wrong, numbers not adding up and stuff. fuck it. a lot of it was used in the scorsese thing right?

I think Scorsese used a lot of the ETD-era Pennebaker footage, but I'm not sure how much of it was actually from ETD.

Oh well, it's on youtube in pieces, but the bootleg DVD looks great

Finally saw this. Pretty good, but could have used a dash of Brother Bru-Bru's Hot Sauce.

two-disc edition in stores today.

DVD waiting for me at liberry. Anyone seen the extras?

No, but that sounds like a very good idea indeed.