contemporary world cinema for salmon arm and kelowna |
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I'm Not There
Country: USA
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The director of I’m Not There, Todd Haynes (Far from Heaven) creates a biopic that shows the elusive and mercurial composer/musician Bob Dylan (Robert Zimmerman) in all his guises. He achieves that here by casting 6 actors who illustrate different aspects of Dylan’s life. One of the actors is an African-American boy (Marcus Carl Franklin) who claims to be Woody Guthrie; a second is Jack, a Greenwich Village folk singer (Christian Bale); a third is Robbie (Heath Ledger) appearing in a Hollywood film, who settles down, gets married and has kids; a fourth is Jude (Cate Blanchett) a hero who alienates his fans by switching from acoustic to electric guitar and from folk to folk rock; a fifth is an actor (Richard Gere) appearing in a western about Billy the Kid; a sixth is a Dylan (Ben Whishaw) submitting to a contentious interview about his career; and then a double back to Bale, who plays a transformation of the first Dylan, Pastor Jack, a born-again Christian. In the end, the “real” Bob Dylan appears, lit by a spotlight, and blowing into a harmonica with his eyes turned downward (footage from a 1960’s concert), ever the mystery. Coming away from this film the audiences will have heard some great music as Dylan authorized use of his songs both on his own recordings and performed by others, and they will have seen six gifted actors challenged by playing different facets of a complex man. “…a meticulous deconstruction of the legend…” LA Times |
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