Get this one while you can, YouTube pulls down “I’m Not There” clips faster than you can say, “Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again” [ed. it’s already been yanked]
In this Bob Dylan skewed biopic clip, Cate Blanchett/Jude/Dylan and the Band goes electric at the New England Folk Festival and the folk fanatical crowd isn’t’ having it jeering and giving disappointed boos. “Sorry for everything I’ve done and I hope to remedy it soon,” (a line straight from “Eat The Document”) Blanchett’s Dylan composite character says (it sounds like they’re playing “Maggie’s Farm”; we just saw it and can confirm).
The scene then follows disenchanted fans as they gripe about the performance. “It’s like he’s trying to conform to some popular taste with this incredibly corny group behind him, but he’s just prostituting himself,” they complain, again echoing dialogue taken from actual fans bitching in “No Direction Home” and “Dont Look Back.” “And we were his biggest fans,” one girl says totally dejected.
The Italian TV preview then shows off a segment of the Richard Gere scene in “I’m Not There” where the in exile outlaw Dylan is awoken by his dog to the strains of “Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid“s “Billy Theme 1” by Los Lobos Calexico.
First Glimpse Of Christian Bale’s Gospel-Dylan
From there it turns to the early ’80s-era gospel Dylan as played by Christian Bale and we have to admit, Bale doing the Dylan voice and with his raggedy afro is pretty hilarious and maybe a little hard to take seriously.
“All things are made anew. It doesn’t matter what I did before,” Dylan tells one of the church leaders before he goes onstage and sermonizes to the congregation.
“It doesn’t matter what music you played, ” Bale as Christian-jewfro’d Dylan says. “We’re all rolled up in the devil’s pocket.” Then Bale and his choir band launch into the Saved-era gospel track, “Pressin’ On” (performed by John Doe formerly of X).
Unfortunately, you can’t embed this clip, but click on the image of Cate above to get to the YouTube clip. The entire thing is about 6 minutes from the film.
Soundtrack Note
Btw, according to the NRBQ website (which confirms something an insider told us), keyboardist Terry Adams, along with John Sebastian (Lovin’ Spoonful) and Buckwheat Zydeco, joined Yo La Tengo to record two Bob Dylan songs (“I Wanna Be Your Lover,” “Fourth Time Around”) by Bob Dylan for the “I’m Not There” soundtrack.
