Bob Dylan – No Direction Home Review
Martin Scorsese’s Bob Dylan opus, screened on BBC 2 in the UK, in late September 2005, was an in-depth look at Dylan’s formative years, up to the time of the “Judas” insults and his motorcycle crash in 1966. Ultimately, it’s a documentary that inspires, though the film ended abruptly, when it would have been better to at least have seen some glimpses of Dylan post-1966.
Maybe’s there’s too much non-Dylan material in this near three-and-a-half hour film, but, overall, it’s an enthralling look at Dylan’s early career, with comments from the man himself – from now and the 1960s. Much of the archive footage is drawn from two sources – D.A. Pennebaker’s film on Dylan’s 1965 tour of England, ‘Don’t Look Back’, and Murray Lerner’s ‘Festival’ – covering the 1963 Newport Folk Festival.
The film goes into Dylan’s early influences, particularly