Common Sense Note
Parents need to know that this experimental meditation on the "many lives of Bob Dylan" will go straight over the head of most younger viewers. Older teens who've been exposed to Dylan's music may be curious about the drama, but its metaphoric nature means it probably won't appeal to most of them -- or to non-fan adults, for that matter. Without a fair amount of knowledge of Dylan's music and life, the film will seem confusing and slow. There are a few love scenes and shots of naked breasts and buttocks, not to mention one quick full-frontal flash of a post-shower Heath Ledger. Expect some language (standard R-rated stuff), a bit of '60s pill-popping, and lots of smoking.
Families can talk about the film's messages about artists, fame, music, and authenticity. What points do you think the director was trying to make? Also, none of the "Bob Dylan" characters are actually named that. Was that confusing or liberating? How is the film vastly different than other musicians' biopics? Do you prefer this approach or a more traditional one? Why?
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Sandie Angulo Chen
In I'M NOT THERE, a British TV journalist calls Jude Quinn -- Cate Blanchett's stand-in for Bob Dylan -- an adored musician despite his "asthmatic, whiny voice." If that echoes your own opinion of Dylan, this isn't the film for you. But if the poet/singer/legend born Robert Zimmerman is as important to you as, say, jazz is to Ken Burns, director Todd Haynes' film is a moving, innovative tribute.
Despite what the film's marketing campaign might have you believe, the movie's six main actors are never actually called Bob Dylan. In fact, there's no mention of his name at all except for an "inspired by" credit. (And, of course, the soundtrack is filled with his music.) Instead, the six characters are all metaphoric representations of different facets of Dylan's persona, from an 11-year-old African-American boy (Marcus Carl Franklin) who rides the rails and goes by the name Woody Guthrie to a Greenwich Village-based folk singer named Jack Rollins (Christian Bale) to a hip Hollywood actor (Heath Ledger) whose marriage to a lovely painter (Charlotte Gainsbourg) is failing.
There's also a 19-year-old interviewee named Arthur Rimbaud (Ben Whishaw), aging Old West outlaw Billy the Kid (Richard Gere) and, most thrillingly, Blanchett's late-'60s icon Jude Quinn. Some of the characters -- like Jude, Jack, and Woody -- are infinitely more interesting than others, such as the enigmatic Arthur and the confusing Billy the Kid. But all are supposed to spark a connection to Dylan's biography. With such a stream-of-consciousness approach to Dylan's essence, however, those without extensive background knowledge of the man and his art are left out of the collective joke/excitement/nostalgia.
Haynes is, stylistically, a master of his craft. It's likely that I'm Not There will one day be studied in graduate film courses. But audiences less interested in style than substance will have to make due with Blanchett's sublime performance and the notable work of Bale, Franklin, and Gainsbourg. Each story is also strengthened by its own color palette and accompanying Dylan song.
By the time the real singer plays his harmonica, in close-up, at the very end, we've come no further in understanding who the real Dylan is or was -- but it's fascinating, albeit at times frustrating, to guess which parts Haynes got right.
Families with older teens who like biopics about legendary singers might enjoy the more-traditional Ray, Walk the Line, and Coal Miner's Daughter. For more about Dylan, check out the Martin Scorsese-directed documentary No Direction Home.
Rate It!
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Sexual ContentA couple of artistic lovemaking scenes -- in one, breasts are visible. There's a glimpse of a full-frontal Heath Ledger as he emerges out of the shower. Several kisses and three images of men's buttocks. |
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ViolenceCartoonish image of young Woody being swallowed by a whale and a fantasy sequence of Jude and his band machine-gunning the crowd at a concert (it's a metaphor for Dylan going electric). Disturbing scene in which a murdered young woman is propped up in her coffin for everyone at a funeral to see. A child pets a dead horse. |
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LanguageMore prevalent in some sequences than others. Words include "s--t," "a--hole," "c--ksucker," "tit," "f--k," "bitch," "p---y," "goddamn," etc. |
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Social BehaviorSuggests that even in a celebrity-obsessed culture, you never really know who an artist is, as he may be various different versions of himself all at once. |
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Commercialism |
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Drug/Alcohol/TobaccoPill-popping during '60s mod scenes; cigarette smoking throughout. Minor social drinking. |
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