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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
We who grew up with Bob Dylan are given a feast here. I just saw the film and will see it again, it's simply gorgeous and coherent in a way that few reveiwers report.
Stephanie: I lost you long ago when you recommended the horrid "Masked and Anonymous." But you NAILED this masterpiece. I don't know who at Salon is online the night before Thanksgiving (or this whole day) but these posts are really blighted.
The film is everything that we who know Dylan from the inside, from living when he lived, should be simply agog at how very great this film is. To "get" it one would have to have seen "No Direction Home" and "Don't Look Back" and many other films as well as loving the great music he created and creates. Go see it. Do not listen to all these whiners in the majority here. Have respect for both Haynes and Dylan and have a ball.
You are obviously a Dylanologist. Just like a Scientologist, except you worship The Great Boob--I mean, Bob--instead of L. Ron Hubbard. And dear Chris, there is nothing more BORING than a zealot, particularly one who can't choose a pair of socks without consulting "Dylanetics"("Oh Bob! Joker socks or Thief socks?")
Grow up? Since when does disliking arrogant HYPOCRITES a sign of not growing up? So hawking panties and banks is a sly, satirical COMMENT! Humbug; rich guy just wanted to get richer.
I think most artists sell out. We've all heard Muzak versions of songs by some artist or band we like. All's I'm saying is that there will always be a warm place in my little black heart for those who DON'T opt for being musical versions of Harold Robbins or Thomas Kincaid.
Brightstar and Captcrisis, hear, hear!
I remember the early, heady days when Dylan was a guilty pleasure, known only to the, yes, cognoscenti. Then he went and did a bad thing: he produced a series of brilliant albums that guaranteed him immortality. No matter what he did before or has done since, there remains the uncomfortable fact of these masterworks. Now every Tom, Dick, and Bozo thinks he has a right to stick his oar in and say foolish things about Bob Dylan. The fact remains, not even the man himself can deny his genius. It's as palpable as the album cover for Blonde on Blonde or Highway 61 Revisited (obviously a source of inspiration for Haynes' film). It's as plain as the air we breathe.
"There must be some way up out of here, said the junky to the thief.
. . .in that arrangement of words, proof positive of Dylan's brilliance. Those words, all by themselves, have natural rhythm and melody, something incredibly difficult to achieve in either poetry or song."
Hmmm...
"Step into my parlor, said the spider to the fly."
That spider/fly thing! It's brilliant! I've got just one word to tell you --Plastics!--I mean, Starbucks, my boy! Starbuck's.
Qui êtes-vous, Monsieur Bob Dylan?
If this is such an “essential” question then why not offer a translation for all of us English speaking readers?
Kind of presumptuous to assume all your readers would understand French.
It means "Who are you, Mr. Bob Dylan?" Fortunately one doesn't run into French phrases in books--without translations--so often anymore, but when I do it drives me nuts--French isn't THE international language anymore and my own is weak.
This review is so overwrought, so hyperbolic, so wordy, so absolutely free of criticism, and entirely too fraught with modifiers while deliciously insinuating its way past actual nouns and hopeful-faced verbs -- and at the same time manages odd sentence construction.
Dylan was good. The movie may or may not be. The review stinks.
very early 60s, With Joan Baez. I liked her, great voice; I didn't like Dylan, terrible voice. I think I was 12 or 13, my sister and her boyfriend took me.
Listened to Dylan in late 60s, college, liked a lot, got the albums. Since then, don't have all albums but a good many.
Seen him only once live since then, in 1980s I think. Hope to see him again live, but not a huge priority, have passed by several opportunities.
Love his music even more now. Bothers me now and then that he would have gone off on that silly christian phase and sold his music to commercials, an itching sensation that pulls me up short just to realize that even old people can think like adolescents-i've never been one for ideological purity, you see.
I like his music. I don't know him, nor do I pretend to.
Like springsteen (he's no van morrison or bob dylan, but he's done some good stuff), blues, classical, old jazz, some post parker. Cds gave access to a lot of rhythm and blues, very nice.
In short, I'm far from a dylan freak. I know them-they are harmless. Its just a hobby. Their hobby. who cares?
I liked your posts on norwegian whaling, but your opinion on dylan is silly.
and don't forget, you are known by the company you keep.
2 ears from john lennon until blonde on blonde? 1967. long enough. thanks for proving my point.
"The Beatles met Dylan at the Hotel Delmonico in New York on 28 August. (1964) He offered to roll a joint, and the Fab Four had to admit they had never partaken before. 'Until then we'd been scotch and Coke men,' McCartney would say later. 'It sort of changed that evening.'"
"The evening was the start of a long, albeit intermittent, friendship with Dylan, and they made arrangements to see him again when they passed through New York at the end of their tour."
anyhoo, brightstar agree with you.......
but saw velvet goldmine a couple years ago. Don't recall much about it other than I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would. His movie with Julianne Moore and Dennis Haysbert was pretty good too.
So, yea, I'll probably see this movie when it comes to hbo.
said this:
"... And I don't think any of his songs will survive the generation that idolizes him..."
but you betrayed your utter stupidity by actually committing that nonsensical piece of crap to print. Think: Bob Dylan wrote songs nearly 50 years ago that are still loved, listened to, analyzed and argued over. I think we've made it past more than just ONE generation who idolize him.
Dylan DID change songwriting. No one before him created songs with the inscrutable layers of meaning he did. As great as many songwriters were, songs pre-Dylan were rarely open to much in the way of interpretation. If you'll bother to take the time to read the lyrics to songs like "Chimes of Freedom," "Lay Down Your Weary Tune," the aforementioned "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" or "Love Minus Zero/No Limit," "Subterranean Homesick Blues"... hell, even "Mr. Tambourine Man" for chrissakes, I can't believe even someone as dim as you knuckleheads could miss the brilliant poetry in those and countless other songs.
Hell, read the opening lines of "Like a Rolling Stone" out loud - don't sing them, say them - and tell me Dylan had no impact on future rap composers.
I don't particularly care if someone doesn't like the music I like - it makes it all the more special to me. But it galls me to no end to hear people slam something that they obviously haven't taken the time to understand.
One last thing: Masked and Anonymous is brilliant, not dreadful or whatever the insult was, though I know that Stephanie and I may well be the only people in the world to feel that way. Stephanie, if you actually read these letters, you won my heart the day I read your review of that movie.
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