Bob Dylan’s enduring love affair with the movies
The new Bob Dylan biopic “Unknown,” starring Timothée Chalamet, will be released in theaters on Christmas Day. As historian Douglas Brinkley tells us, this is just the latest chapter in a long love story between Dylan and movies.
Growing up in the iron-rich town of Hibbing, Minnesota, in the 1940s and 1950s, Bob Dylan didn’t experience much irregularity or social unrest. Except in the movies.
It was at a local theater (one of which was owned by his relatives) that he first met Brigitte Bardot, an early admirer and muse for some of his early songs.
“Well, once my phone rings, it won’t stop.
President Kennedy called me
He said, “My friend Bob, what do we need to grow this country?”
I said, ‘My friend, John, Brigitte Bardot
Anita Ekberg, Sophia Loren…”
——”I Shall Be Free” by Bob Dylan
Young Bob donned a leather jacket after watching Marlon Brando in “The Wild Ones.” When he saw Blackboard Jungle, a teen melodrama with an innovative rock soundtrack, he reportedly told a friend: “This is exactly what we’ve been trying to tell people about ourselves.”
Seeing James Dean’s performance in “Rebel Without a Cause” inspired him to rise up against the constraints of the Cold War era in music.
When Dylan arrived in New York’s Greenwich Village, it was international art films that caught his attention: Truffaut’s “Shooting at the Pianist”… Fellini’s “La Dolce Vita.” The film, about a tabloid reporter’s futile search for fulfillment in hedonistic Rome, was “like life in a carnival mirror,” Dylan later said.
However, Dylan’s first major film appearance was a cameo in Sam Peckinpah’s Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. The film spawned the classic song “Knocking on Heaven’s Door,” now nobel prize winnerMost played songs.
His music has enhanced the quality of film scores, from “The Big Lebowski” to the recent “St. Vincent.”
One movie has stuck with Dylan for decades: The Gunslinger, starring Gregory Peck. When Peck heard his name on Dylan’s 1986 epic ballad “Brownsville Girl,” he called him to thank him. In 1997, Peck reiterated his gratitude when he awarded Dylan a Kennedy Center Honor.
The new biopic “Unknown,” starring Timothée Chalamet, isn’t Dylan’s first film. But it’s a reminder of the enduring symbiotic relationship between Dylan and film… and a welcome excuse to revisit the work of this uniquely American artist.
To watch the trailer for “Total Unknown,” click on the video player below:
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Story by Robert Marston. Editor: George Pozderek.
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