I'm Not There

Perhaps the Todd Haynes-directed and co-scripted I’m Not There should have been subtitled I'm No- where. Haynes seems to feel that film is best as diary; as long as he gets it, i.e., as long as he communicates with himself, all is well and clear. As he refracts the "life" of Bob Dylan through seven figures--it's hard to call them characters--representing various facets, as Haynes sees them, of the Dylan persona over the decades, it may be possible that he understands why this "life" begins with Dylan's funeral. (Did we miss too many People obituaries?)

While we have been somewhat exposed to this before, in Haynes's Velvet Goldmine--the characters embodied by Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Ewan McGregor seen through that of Christian Bale—in this instance the writer-director has chopped Dylan into pieces, seven, that bounce from male to female, black to white, young to old, literal Dylan to literal/historical non-Dylan, and left it to the hapless viewer to reassemble the pieces. For every Joan Baez actual equivalent (Julianne Moore), there's a Pat Garrett alongside Billy the Kid. (Does that make him Bobby the Kid?)

To segment Dylan into the young black boy (Marcus Carl Franklin), "Woody Guthrie," Christian Bale in two different roles, Heath Ledger, Ben Wishaw, Cate Blanchett, and Richard Gere (as Billy) is to indicate the protean nature of Haynes's imagination, but even more to reveal I'm Not There as more conceit than movie, less film than psychological construct clear only to the analyst, although since Dylan has for the first time allowed the use of his songs and voice for the film, perhaps it's clear to the analyst and as well.

Apparently the filmed biography (biopic in movie jargon) is some silly appurtenance of the previous century; the present biopic must loop backward and forward, in and out, up and down, without and within (especially without), and reveal as much or more about the filmmaker's psyche as about the subject's.

Certainly the performances are not to be faulted, with Bale and Blanchett the most effective. Ledger is given the least to work with. Blanchett affects the offhanded, seemingly disinterested 60's Dylan, though one is always aware this is Cate acting, not Bob (Bobby?). It is always an experiment worth watching rather than a fully credible creation.

Of course, this film will present a great feast for critics and recondites to review the Dylan canon and find, line by line, exegesis for every avant-profundity spouted by the Sacred Seven over the decades. Pity the poor moviegoer.

                                                           Howard Buck