"No Direction Home"

[jazzbo]

Last night the first part of Scorcese's "No Direction Home" aired on PBS.

I thought it was pretty amazing!

Can't wait for tonight's concluding episode!

[Stereojack]

Last night the first part of Scorcese's "No Direction Home" aired on PBS.

I thought it was pretty amazing!

Can't wait for tonight's concluding episode!

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Very amazed at how much vintage footage of good quality they came up with! Really interesting how matter-of-fact Dylan's comments were, considering his long time image as a man of mystery.

[jazzbo]

Yes, I thought his comments were very interesting. . . . And I liked the other interviews as well by Van Ronk, Baez, Seeger, et al.

This is great stuff! Going to be getting the dvds I know. (The two cd set has great material on it as well).

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Excellent show - very well done. I was very surprised at how forthcoming Dylan was. They talked to all the right people otherwise too. Van Ronk, Baez, Ginsburg, et al. Some great stories in there.

Mike

[JohnS]

Amazingly aired in the UK too last evening.

[jlhoots]

I'll have the whole thing on my DVR.

Looking forward to watching it.

[AllenLowe]

yes, excellent, not least because Bobby was so forthcoming - I've always found his past interviews to be like interviews with Cecil Taylor- too hip, too arrogant and extremely annoying - as though they are putting on the world and only they are hip enough to be in on the joke - I loved this documentary, however -

[AllenLowe]

just to add, so far, only annoyance was the doc's failure to id Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee as performing in the film of Woody Guthrie -

[Johnny E]

Man that Odetta footage!

I also liked when Ginsberg got all choked up remembering when he first heard Hard Rain.

Does anybody know if the DVD has all the performances in their entirety?

[RDK]

Does anybody know if the DVD has all the performances in their entirety?

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From what I've read, the doc itself is the same, but the bonus features include several unedited perfrmances.

[A Lark Ascending]

A great evening's TV with more to come tonight. The BBC are using it as an excuse to show lots of other Dylan stuff including 'Don't Look Back'.

I was amazed at how articulate and linear Dylan was. This is the man who built a legend out of bamboozling interviewers with sphinx-like replies and deliberate false trails.

The 'No Direction Home' CD is enthralling too.

[AllenLowe]

actually, my favorite performance, and I would love to see the whole thing, was the Gene Vincent -

Edited September 27, 2005 by AllenLowe

[skeith]

In my opinion, it was not as good as I expected, maybe because my favorite Dylan years are to come tonight.

Not sure what Scorsese was doing last night with interspersing the clips from the live British performance (electric) with the folk era Dylan. Not sure what he want us to do with it or What he feels is the significance of that.

Finally, while Bob is amazingly lucid and coherent compared to other recent interviews I have seen such as that disastrous 60 Minutes one, he still seems rather guarded.

some great clips, interviews and of course great music, but bottom line is that I didn't learn much I didn't already know about Dylan last night and for some reason wasn't as riveted as I expected to be.

[ValerieB]

am i the only one who would be interested in knowing more about his immediate family and how/why he could just apparently turn his back on them?

[AllenLowe]

well, that is true, and that's Dylan, whose careerism was quite ruthless in his early years, using and discarding people as necessary - middle-class Jewish family probably just did not fit the image -

[RDK]

Tivo'd but haven't watched it yet, so maybe it's brought up, but did Dylan actually "turn his back" on his family or merely keep that aspect of his life private by never really mentioning them?

[ValerieB]

Tivo'd but haven't watched it yet, so maybe it's brought up, but did Dylan actually "turn his back" on his family or merely keep that aspect of his life private by never really mentioning them?

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that's not clear. maybe something will be mentioned in the second half.

[Quincy]

Tivo'd but haven't watched it yet, so maybe it's brought up, but did Dylan actually "turn his back" on his family or merely keep that aspect of his life private by never really mentioning them?

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He mentions his family some in Chronicles Vol. 1. He has some positive things to say but it's pretty obvious that he's always felt like something of an outsider to both his town & family. It can happen. Ask Ray Davies.

[Johnny E]

actually, my favorite performance, and I would love to see the whole thing, was the Gene Vincent -

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I forgot about that one. I LOVE GENE VINCENT!!!

[Alexander]

I bought the DVD last week, so I've watched the whole thing already(plus the full-length performance footage). I was also knocked back by Dylan's candor. He's spent so many years jerking the press around, it's really amazing to just listen to the man talk. What really surprised me is that his speaking voice hasn't changed a whole lot since his early days, even though his singing voice has changed tremendously. Given his talent for mimicry and fabrication, one wonders how much of his current singing voice is affected.

I loved the material on his early days in Greenwich Village. The interview footage with his peers really helped to bring that whole scene to life (the material on the same subject in Dylan's autobiography is also very revealing, especially when he talks about performing with Cecil Taylor, Billy Higgins and other jazz musicans). The second half of the documentary is also excellent, but I wonder if there are any plans to do MORE. I mean, this is a great film, but when will we see a doc about "Blood on the Tracks" or the Rolling Thunder Review? How about the making of the Basement Tapes? There's so much more to this story!!!

[Adam]

I watched it last night, and will again tonight.

I like it, but it doesn't wow me. It's more straight forward then I would have expected.

It seems to me that Scorsese was more interested in creating a portrait of the times culturally & musically, so we can understand Dylan's impact. It doesn't seem like we're going to get much about Dylan & his family, nor even of Dylan and his song-writing process.

[Stereojack]

Excellent show - very well done. I was very surprised at how forthcoming Dylan was. They talked to all the right people otherwise too. Van Ronk, Baez, Ginsburg, et al. Some great stories in there.

Mike

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Also, I was impressed that they didn't talk to a single critic or music writer. All of the talking heads were Dylan's contemporaries (or elders), so there was no analytical bullshit about his "significance".

[medjuck]

My only complaint is the use of Billie Holiday singing Strange Fruit as a way to introduce john Hammond. He hated the song and thought it ruined Lady Day.

I wonder what the film lookd like to somone who wasn't already interested in Dylan. I guess they wouldn't watch it.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Well, plenty of writers and critics in this episode - the idiot ones at the press conferences. Boy, some of them were really dumb as a post. And Dylan is ruthless - he just cuts them to shreds. If he were a little sympathetic they wouldn't come off so bad, but he doesn't give in at all and then you find out, "well, I read that in a movie magazine....."

Unfortunately, now we've got the idiot interviewer Charlie Rose on. Somebody please tell me what this guy's credentials are. He knows nothing about *everything* - he's always a goofy grinning fool who overinflates whatever subject he's got. I guess he's the opposite of James Lipton, who fawns just as much except Lipton keeps a perfectly straight face.

Mike

[connoisseur series500]

He knows nothing about *everything* - he's always a goofy grinning fool who overinflates whatever subject he's got.

A good description of Charlie Rose.