No Direction Home: Bob Dylan 26 Sep 2005
11 comments Latest by Joe
Tonight is the premiere of Martin Scorcese’s PBS documentary “No Direction Home: Bob Dylan.” The two-part film, which focuses on Dylan’s life and music from 1961-66, includes never-seen performance footage and interviews with artists and musicians whose lives intertwined with Dylan’s during that time.
“When we first began discussing this project years ago, we were overwhelmed by the material at hand - home movies and history-making concert footage, fascinating interviews with Dylan’s friends and fellow performers and, of course, Dylan himself, speaking so frankly about this incredible period in his life,” said [Susan] Lacy, series creator and executive producer of AMERICAN MASTERS. “What we needed - above all - was an artist with a singular vision who could fuse this material into a unique visual narrative. That artist was Martin Scorsese, who graciously agreed to direct.”
Should be fascinating, especially since it focuses on the era when Dylan was doing some of his juiciest work. Blonde on Blonde (1966), Highway 61 Revisited (1965), and Bringing It All Back Home (1965) are fantastic, poetic records. To bang them out in a two-year stretch is proof of one serious artistic groove.
11 comments so far (Jump to latest)
brad 26 Sep 05
The current issue (#90) of Granta has a transcript of Studs Terkel’s 1963 interview with Dylan; definitely worth reading.
Raymond Brigleb 26 Sep 05
Plus, it appears the DVD is being released simultaneously for those of us without a TV - Netflix claims a “Short Wait” in my queue!
dusoft 26 Sep 05
Your RSS/RDF seems not to work.
Kjell Olsen 26 Sep 05
Has anyone seen the glossy ads for production in magazines? There’s a little apple logo, bottom right. Apparently apple is underwriting the project: “Apple will present the DVD and international version of NO DIRECTION HOME: BOB DYLAN, and is the corporate underwriter of the PBS broadcast.” [linked press release]
Cool, but anyone have an idea why?
Kikuchiyo 26 Sep 05
Because Bob Dylan is Steve Job’s favorite performer?
John Jantsch 26 Sep 05
Did you check out the musical influences map on the PBS website?
Dean 27 Sep 05
I watched the first part last night. While entertaining, it didn’t exactly seem like “groundbreaking” documentary material.
My favorite footage was of the concert in England, with Dylan backed by a full electric band (an early incarnation of “the Band”?) The crowd was not diggin’ it and there was so much tension in the air - a truely “electrifying” perfomance.
KTS 27 Sep 05
Dean,
4/5ths of the Band - the England shows included all Band members except for levon. At that time they were known as the Hawks, named after Ronnie Hawkins whom they backed after breaking out on there own known as Levon Helms and the Hawks, then becoming the Band later in that decade, etc…
If you liked the england concerts, definately get “Live 66” which features the Albert Hall concert of that tour. It is as you said very electrifying.
Darrel 27 Sep 05
Watched it last night and found it a lot like Dylan. Entertaining, but rambling and off-script a lot of the time. Maybe that’s intentional. ;o)
Joe 13 Nov 05
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