Very Confusing Mix Of Awesome And Awful In One Bottle

Rating: 8/10 (11 August 2015)

Where to start here? I'm Not There is a very daunting, serious, far- fetching, high;y intellectual, brainy and at the same time, painful, awkward, clumsy, weird and sometimes sick movie with elements of great and gross, high and haughty, likable and lecherous, sweet and sick, fine and foolish. It reminded me heavily of Oliver Stone's Nixon, with its spiraling, non-linear, crazy pace, feedback, change of colors, abrupt jumps, foreshadowing, unexpected twists and all the same. Is this movie any good? Yes, it is. The performances of multitude of actors are all spellbinding and breathtaking - Marcus Carl Franklin, Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw,
Charlotte Gainsbourg , David Cross, Eugene Brotto, Bruce Greenwood, Julianne Moore, Michelle Williams, Mark Camacho, Benz Antoine , Craig Thomas, Richie Havens, Kim Roberts, Kris Kristofferson, Don Francks, Vito DeFilippo and Susan Glover, Paul Spence - an amazing array of huge talents and powerful bandwagon of artistry. Music is excellent throughout, too - the original Dylan's songs as well as new tracks are just superb. What is also good here - excellent play of allusions to Dylan's life - Newport fest, Judas shout, family problems, The Beatles, drugs, poetry, Tarantula, many other things are thrilling and a real eye- feast for Dylan fans. What is bad? Uneven pace, some mannerisms, some really vapid moments, some unnecessary longer monologues, some utterly silly moments at all - they spoil the party much. But still, even 2 hours are not long here and the movie flows almost (almost) seamlessly. Pity, it was not cut to a closer perfection. But, it is very hard to make a decent biopic. I do recommend this to Dylan buffs, to folk rock fans... the rest? Maybe, not. Todd Haynes has made a great work, but not all are ready to see Dylan played by a woman.