Brianland

 

This is a scene-by-scene breakdown of the Dylan biopic masterpiece co-written and directed by James Mangold.  Besides being one of the best living filmmakers, Mangold was undoubtably tapped because of how well he handled the Oscar-winning Johnny Cash biopic Walk The Line.

The movie was in development for a couple years when Covid hit.  Just prior to the lockdown, Mangold and Bob’s management team were at an impasse.  Mangold and his cowriter Jay Cocks (who’d helped Scorsese with his No Direction Home documentary about the same period) had written the script that basically became the movie we know.  But Bob’s people were saying they didn’t like how it focused on his personal life and wanted it more about his songwriting.  Mangold maintained that a movie is about people and relationships.  Neither side was backing down.

Then Dylan’s 2020 tour got canceled due to the lockdown.  Suddenly he was unexpectedly sitting around, and asked his office to send him the script.  To their surprise (and embarrassment) he loved it.  Of Mangold, Bob told his office, “He doesn’t have an agenda.”  And added they should ask the director if he wants to meet up.

That began a series of five full afternoons they spent together.  As Mangold tells it, the first meeting, he was expecting to last maybe an hour.  But Bob just wanted to keep talking movies and filmmaking all day.

They went over the script line-by-line multiple times, with Bob adding lines and context and background.  They even did a table read together with Bob reading all the lines we heard Timothee Chalamet deliver, and Mangold performing all the other parts.

The movie turned out to be a biopic masterpiece — and it’s gotta be the only one in history that the subject had such a direct hand in creating.  And . . . it’s Bob frickin’ Dylan’s hand!

I created this breakdown because I wanted to understand how they did it.  It gave me cause to look up some of the songs we only hear briefly in passing.  I transcribed a bunch of the dialog so I’d have a record of what exactly was on screen.  And I time-coded it so that I could go directly to any scene I wanted to re-investigate.

I also did this in an even more detailed way for Peter Jackson’s historic The Beatles: Get Back.  That’s turned out to be one of the most popular pieces on my website which has nearly 300 stories on it.  Many people read the piece every single day, and I’ve heard from both college professors and high school teachers in both the U.S. and the U.K. who’ve told me they’ve used it in their classrooms.  So I figured this might be something others would find useful.

If you want more background on the movie, there’s a feature story on my site that goes into a lot of the background on how it got made with lotsa creators’ quotes and videos and details.

 

0:05 – opening audio: Woody Guthrie’s Dusty Old Dust (So Long It’s Been Good To Know Yuh)

0:50 – Bob riding in back of station wagon crossing the bridge from New Jersey into Manhattan

1:40 – Bob walking along Minetta Lane past the Cafe Wha? – onto MacDougal Street – to the Kettle of Fish

3:00 – Bob asks the bartender where Greystone Hospital is,
Dave Van Ronk walks up to the bar and tells him it’s in New Jersey

3:10 – Pete Seeger in court – actor and Kerouac aficionado Peter Gerety as the one-eyed judge

4:30 – Pete sings This Land Is Your Land on the actual New York County Courthouse steps

5:10 – Bob gets out of cab at Greystone Hospital
finds Woody’s room – meets him and Pete Seeger

9:30 – Bob sings Song For Woody – masterful – every song in the movie is played live on camera.  The long note he holds at the end was unplanned and caught everyone by surprise including Chalamet.

12:00 – car ride with Pete, discusses rock ‘n’ roll,
Pete doesn’t care for it, and Bob says “Yeah, but sometimes it sounds good.”
Arrive at Pete’s house, meets Toshi.
They set him up on bed in the living room.
Pete & Toshi in bed: “He just played us a hell of a song.”

14:15 – Bob next morning playing what he’d written so far of Girl From The North Country – Pete & the family listen

16:15 – Pete Seeger on stage at Town Hall type venue, Bob watching admiringly from the wings

17:25 – Joan seen from behind walking along the sidewalk to Folk City.
She goes into dressing room, Albert Grossman is waiting, she tells him to leave

18:35 – Joan on stage singing beautifully House of The Rising Sun 

21:30 – Pete Seeger introduces Bob – “A month or so ago Woody and I met a young man.  He kinda just dropped in on us, and he sang us a song.  Well, it fairly struck us to the ground.  And Woody and I felt that maybe we were gettin’ a glimpse of a new road.  This young man has been playing around town a bit, but I thought it was high time he took the stage at Folk City.  So, I want you to give a warm welcome to Bob Dylan.”
Bob compliments Joan, says she’s pretty, “And she sings pretty, maybe a little too pretty.”

22:15 – Bob sings I Was Young When I Left Home – GREAT song choice
(not released until No Direction Home soundtrack Bootleg Series Vol 7 in 2005)
Both Columbia Records producer John Hammond and New York Times reviewer Robert Sheldon in crowd.

24:50 – Bob shows up late for his recording session
Albert reads him the Robert Sheldon New York Times review in the elevator.  Bob doesn’t like it until Albert reads, “… but when he works his guitar, there is no doubt he is bursting at the seams with talent.”
Bob: “Hey!  What?” and he grabs the paper from Albert. 😀 

25:40 — Bob in the Columbia Studio A recording studio.
John Hammond at the mixing console.
Bob plays Fixin’ To Die (by Booker T. Washington)
26:35 – Albert: “He has originals, too, you know.  And they’re really good.”
John Hammond: “Not now, Albert.  We’re putting a younger face on folk.”

26:45 – Bob singing his All Over You at the Riverside Church Hootenanny.
Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee sing Walk On.
Bob meets & starts talking to Suze Rotolo/Sylvie in a pew.
She tells Bob who Alan Lomax is.

29:25 – Bob & Sylvie walking on Village streets.
Go to see Now, Voyager movie.
Sylvie: “I thought we were going to see Guernica at the Museum.”
Bob: “Ah, Picasso’s overrated.”  

30:50 – Bob & Sylvie in diner after seeing movie.
Sylvie: “What do you want to be?”
Bob: “A musician.  Who eats.”
Sylvie: “Well, I like your songs.”
Bob: “My record comes out in a couple weeks.”
Sylvie: “Some of the songs you played today on your record?”
Bob: “It’s mostly covers.  It’s traditional stuff.  Y’know, folk songs are supposed to stand the test of time, like Shakespeare or something.  They say no one wants to hear what a kid wrote last month.”
Sylvie: “Who’s ‘they’?”
Bob: “The record company.  Manager.”
Sylvie: “I’m sorry, but, Where Have All The Flowers Gone? is not Shakespeare.  There was a time when the old songs were new, right?  Someone at some point had to give the songs a chance.  I mean, there’s a civil war going on down south.  The biggest military buildup in history.  Nuclear bombs hanging over us.  It’s not all about the Dust Bowl and Johnny Appleseed anymore.”

32:35 – They walk on nighttime sidewalk at night to Sylavie’s subway stop, talk of CORE, she gives him a (writer & Partisan Review editor) Dwight Macdonald article.  “He’s contrarian, like you.”
She gives him her number.

33:40 – Bob in a neighborhood record store, sees Joan Baez’s albums selling well.

34:15 – Sylvie takes Bob to a Black protest rally.

34:35 – Bob & Sylvie arrive at their apt.  Mailman catches them.  “Package for Zimmerman.”

34:50 – Bob up in the middle of the night writing songs.

35:10 – Bob at Woody’s room in the hospital singing him Blowin’ In The Wind.
An orderly comes in and tells him to stop singing – Bob bolder now – speaks up.
Orderly: “There’s another gentleman in this room and he’s trying to rest.”
Bob: “Yeah, he’s been resting for six months.  I don’t think it’s working.” 😀
Pete arrives, “Well, I guess every deck come with two jokers, don’t it?”  😀

36:30 – party in Bob & Sylvie’s apartment.
Dave Van Ronk talking to Bob & Peter Yarrow.  “You can call it country or blues or rock ‘n’ roll – we all keep rewriting the same song.”

37:25 – Bob watching Johnny Cash on TV while Sylvie is packing for trip to Italy.
Sylvie wants to get to know the real Bob.
“You’re ambitious.  I think that scares you.”
She tells him to write his own songs.  Of his debut album, “It’s all other people’s music.”

40:25 – Cuban Missile Crisis news reports – October 16–28, 1962.
Bob sitting on the floor writing songs surrounded by images – as he’s known to have done.
People freaking out on the streets.
Cronkite on TV in the Seeger home.
Joan in her Chelsea Hotel room trying to reach her family on the phone.

42:20 – Joan walks down sidewalk – the city in panic, people trying to evacuate.
She hears Bob playing Masters of War in the Gaslight.
Bob & Joan make out at the top of the stairs.

44:45 – Joan wakes up the morning after in Bob’s apartment;
Turns on TV, Cuban Missile Crisis averted.
She looks at his desk, copy of On The Road and lots of lyrics.

46:30 – conversation about how Bob learned guitar.
Joan: “Who taught you to play?”
Bob: “I taught myself, really.  Picked up a few licks at the carnival.”
Joan: [in disbelief] “At the carnival?”
Bob: “Oh yeah, there was singing cowboys that come through teach me all sorts of funny chords.  They’d pass through doin’ shows in Kansas or Dakotas.  These chords I learned from a cowboy named Wigglefoot.”
Joan: “You were in a carnival?  (pause)  You are so completely full of shit.”  😀

Bob: “You try too hard.  To write.  Sunsets and seagulls, smell of buttercups.  Your songs are like an oil painting at the dentist office.”
Joan: “You’re kind of an asshole, Bob.”
Bob: “Yeah, I guess.”  🙂

48:10 – Bob sings Blowin’ In The Wind — Joan joins him harmonizing beautifully.
They have their moment of real connection.

50:45 – Joan: “So, this is … what?”
Bob: “I don’t know.”

Joan wants to record Blowin’

51:15 – Sylvie returns from Italy
Bob on phone: “Albert, I gotta go.”

Sylvie: “Did you teach yourself to make coffee?!”  😀  got big laugh in the theater every time
Bob: “Oh . . . yeah.”  😀

52:00 – Bob in recording studio recording Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright.
Tom Wilson engineering – “Who wrote this?”
Grossman [pointing]: “He did.”

52:35 – outdoor Village street photo shoot of Bob & Sylvie for Freewheelin cover.

52:55 – Joan in a theater singing Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright.
The camera pans over to recording / broadcasting equipment & engineers.

53:30 – photo shoot in Bob & Sylvie’s apartment.
Bob preparing to fly to the west coast.
The audio of Joan singing Don’t Think Twice in concert (above) is continuing in the apartment on the radio.
Sylvie senses the connection between Bob & Joan.

54:55 – Bob on motorcycle to Joan’s house in the country.
Warm reception.
Joan: “The new record is beautiful.”  (Freewheelin’)

56:10 – Monterey Folk Festival 1963 (May 17-19)
Dylan’s first ever performance on the west coast.
(Jerry Garcia also played at it with The Wildwood Boys, including Robert Hunter on upright bass (!), David Nelson on guitar & Ken Frankle on fiddle.  Janis also sang solo on a second stage!)
Bob & Joan lovely smiling duet — Girl From The North Country

57:30 – Bob picks up fan mail at Columbia Records
He gets check for $10,000 and a letter from Johnny Cash.  Fame has happened.
Johnny: “Your Freewheelin’ album is my most prized possession.”

58:30 – Bob in Town Hall (NYC) singing A Hard Rain’s A’Gonna Fall.

58:55 – Bob walking on Village street reading the April 13, 1963, NY Times review of his Town Hall performance. 

59:05 – Bob gets recognized and chased by fans in the Village — fame happening – conveyed in 2 mins.

59:10 – Bob plays at the March on Washington – August 28, 1963.
Sylvie sad in apt. watching it on TV – realizing Bob is getting bigger than them in the Village.

59:30 – Bob leaves a gig, mobbed, gets in back of car, homage to Don’t Look Back scene.

59:45 – Bob on plane writes to Johnny Cash.
Cash writes him back — first time we see Johnny – on a plane writing letter.
(According to director Mangold they used the text of the actual letters from the Dylan archive.)
Bob: [in voiceover reading the letter he’s writing to Johnny Cash on an airplane] “Dear Johnny,  Thanks for that letter.  I am now famous — famous by the rules of public famiosity.  It snuck up on me and pulverized me.  To quote Mr. Freud, I get quite paranoid.”
Johnny Cash: [in voiceover reading the letter he’s writing to Dylan on an airplane.] “Bob — Got your letter.  Tonight I sit in the wake of one more hard rain.  I was in New York last week.  Saw a bunch of folk singers that couldn’t hold a chigger on your ass.  Well, I’ll see you in Newport come spring.  Until then, track mud on somebody’s carpet.”

1:00:35 – Bob playing in a Town Hall type theater A Hard Rain’s A Gonna Fall.
Albert says to Pete – “This is your dream — folk music reaching everybody.”

1:01:20 – Pete at Woody’s bedside, saying he’s going to go on a world tour.
Woody wants Pete to give Bob his harmonica.
The one scene in the movie I think is tonally off – too slow, somber for this point in the flow.

1:02:40 – JFK dies – Nov 22nd, 1963
Bob & Sylvie sad in apartment taking in the news.

1:03:00 – Joan at Newport 1964 (July 24-26) — singing Phil Ochs’s There But For Fortune

1:04:30 – Johnny Cash arrives backstage.  Bob & Johnny meet for the first time.

1:04:45 – Pete Seeger introduces Johnny Cash & The Tennessee Three

1:05:25 – Cash goes on stage – sings Big River
“Let’s get these beatniks out of their seat real quick and tie one on.”  😀

1:06:15 – then Folsom Prison Blues

1:06:40 – Johnny introduces Bob as his pen pal.  “Sometimes when I read his letters I think I can see his brain.”

1:07:15 ­– Bob says, “Here’s a new one” – sings The Times They Are a’ Changin’
Pete, Toshi, Johnny Cash, Leventhal, Grossman, Lomax, Peter Yarrow, Odetta in the wings in awe and smiling.  Joan is reserved – perhaps in awe, seeing the future.
Sylvie’s sad – that he’s moved to some realm beyond them – we see her thinking he’s singing about their relationship & future – “The present now will later be past.”
At the end Pete goes “Phew!” and looks up to the heavens like he can’t believe what’s happening.
* GREAT final long powerful stare by Dylan into the audience – almost menacing – a man in complete control – with the conviction and power to change things.

 

screen goes black

 

1:10:08  —     “1965”    —  title card — the movie TOTALLY changes
This begins the whole second half of the movie with a different tone and pace and new rock n roll conviction.

1:10:15 – Bob bursts out of the Kettle of Fish, walks down MacDougal Street – shades and full head of tussled hair

Hears Chris Ducey’s That’s The Way The World Has Got To Be (II) coming out of the Gaslight
Walks past hippie van with doors open and people singing Puff The Magic Dragon
Spots whistle for sale
Street vender: “You got kids?”
Bob: “Yeah, thousands of ’em.”

takes off on motorcycle thru Village streets

1:11:20 – Harold Leventhal fancy fundraising party
Bob arrives with Becka
Allen Ginsberg character seen in the background of several shots
also a Peter, Paul & Mary trio
Alan Lomax – “The word on the street is you’re making quite a noise down there at Studio A.  Listen Bob, you don’t have to compete with the Beatles, okay?  You’re better than that shit.”
Harold Leventhal pressures Bob to play at the party.
Pete brings guitar for Bob to play.

1:13:10 – Bob & Pete (on vocals & banjo) – When The Ship Comes In

1:14:05 – the great elevator scene with Bobby Neuwirth

Bob: “Two hundred people in that room and each one wants me to be somebody else.  They should just fuck off and let me be.”
Bobby Neuwirth: “Be what?”
Bob: “Excuse me?”
Neuwirth: “They should fuck off and let you be what?”
Bob: “I don’t know.  Whatever it is they don’t want me to be.”
Neuwirth: “Y’know, I’m not a horse, so … I don’t like carrying other people’s weight.”
Bob: “Yeah, well, I got a hundred pounds on me that don’t show on the scale.”
Neuwirth: “How do you sing then?”
Bob: “I put myself in another place.  But I’m a stranger there.”

1:15:05 – Bob asks Neuwirth’s name on the sidewalk.  “Bobby.  Like you, man.”  He says he’s going to play a gig a McCann’s in the East Village.

1:15:30 – Bob & Becka scene on sidewalk
Becka: “I love you.  Is that scary to you?”
Bob: “I just met you.  So, yeah.”

1:16:10 – Neuwirth in bar playing Irish Rover with Irish band
Bob gets recognized.  When he tries to leave a girl says she wants to see his eyes and grabs his glasses off his face.
When Bob grabs them back and says “Get off,” her boyfriend punches Bob in the eye and he falls to the ground.
Neuwirth helps him up & out of the bar.

1:17:15 – Bob goes to Sylvie’s apartment 4AM – comes by cuz of punch to face.
Great confessional moment to his old love:
Bob: “Everyone asks where these songs come from, Sylvie.  But then you watch their faces, and they’re not asking where the songs come from.  They’re asking why the songs didn’t come to them.”

1:18:45 – Bob in recording studio at upright piano working on I’ll Keep It With Mine
Bob writing at typewriter
Bob blowing new whistle in bathtub
* Bob rushes in apartment with Like A Rolling Stone lyrics

1:19:30 – Bob on phone with Albert demanding Mike Bloomberg.
Bob: “Not Mike Bloom*feld*, Albert, Mike Bloom*field*, he’s a Chicago blues guitar player.”
Albert: “Okay, I can’t get him tomorrow.  I can get another guitar player.”
Bob: “No! I don’t want any of your old session musicians, man.  I want young guys with hair on their heads.  A guitar player, and a bass player, an organ player and a drum player.”
Albert: “I’m gonna try my best but I can’t guarantee that we’re gonna get him tomorrow.”
Bob: “I don’t wanna hear it.  Get it done.”
Bob slams down receiver.

1:19:55 – Bob and new band in recording studio playing Subterranean Homesick Blues
John Hammond: “Well, this is gonna piss some people off.”  😀

1:20:15 – tense Archive meeting planning Newport ’65.
Theodore Bikel at planning table.  He lists the players for Saturday night: Ian & Sylvia, Odetta, Donovan, Johnny Cash, Jim Kweskin & his Jug Band . . .
Peter Yarrow advocates for the Paul Butterfield Blues Band – cites Mike Bloomfield
Alan Lomax being a jerk – dismissing Butterfield and insulting Peter Yarrow.
Pete tries to make peace among the organizers.  “We don’t need to be dogmatic.” … “We can work it out.”

1:21:50 – Bob and band recording Highway 61 with whistle

1:22:55 – abrupt cut to — Pete’s local B&W TV show at NJU with old black blues guy Jesse Moffette (the only purely fictional character in the movie)
Jesse starts playing original blues tune Down In My Heart

1:24:35 – Bob & Neuwirth show up

1:25:30 – Bob joins Jesse on the TV set
Jesse: “Look here, how close were you watching me?”
Bob: “I was watchin real close, Jesse.  I got these special binoculars, right?  And they allow me to see into your soul.”
Jesse: [laughing] “Really?”
Bob: “I could see exactly what you were playing.  It’s like a tiny little microscope, right?”

1:26:40 – Bob starts playing the same blues tune again, Jesse on slide & Pete on banjo – Down In My Heart
Bob weaves it into It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry

1:27:45 – Bob goes to Chelsea Hotel to find Joan, knocks on various doors (can’t remember Joan’s exact room)
1:28:40 – Joan opens hotel room door
Joan: “Do you want me to catch up with you or something?”
Bob: “Yeah.” and slips past her into the room
Bob in hotel room in dark writing It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)
Joan throws Bob out.

1:31:45 – Bob & Joan on stage in a theater – acoustic duet – All I Really Want To Do
Bob wanders off singing Gates of Eden to himself.
He and Joan clash – Bob won’t play Blowin’ In The Wind
Bob: “It’s not a request type concert.  If you want that, go see Donovan.” 🙂
Bob says his guitar is broken and won’t play.
Joan starts singing Blowin’ solo.

1:32:25 – Neuwirth arrives at recording studio with Bob’s new electric guitar he bought in London.
He starts playing & singing the traditional Railroad Bill.
Dylan appears out of the darkness playing harmonica . . . then switches to the upright piano.

1:36:05 – Mike Bloomfield arrives
1:36:15 – Al Kooper arrives …
Bob: “We already have a guitar player, man, Mike Bloomfield.  And he’s really good.  To be better than him you’d have to be Blind Willie McTell.”

1:36:45 – Kooper & Tom Wilson in control room.  “You don’t play keyboards, Al.”
Al goes and sits at the Hammond B3.

1:37:25 – Al starts playing the organ to Like A Rolling Stone

1:37:45 – Bob & Al in Village clothing store, sees Pete Seeger thru the window.

1:38:00 – outside store, Neuwirth & company loading trunk of car.
Pete & Bob talk outside store – Pete wants to know how Bob’s gonna close Newport Sunday night.
Bob kinda blows him off, saying “Let’s talk at Newport.  I’m sorta living day-to-day these days, y’know?”
Pete looks dejected … that his former protege has moved on.

1:38:30 – Bob arrives on motorcycle at Sylvie’s apt, calls up, asks her to come to Newport.
Sylvie seen pondering the question while in her painting smock in apartment.
They ride off on motorcycle together to the sounds of Mr. Tambourine Man.

1:40:00 – arrive at the artists’ motel in Newport
Bob sees Jesse the blues player
Bob & Sylvie check into their motel room
Dylan does the light two cigarettes routine
Neuwirth brings in guitars – “Choose your weapon, general.  You got this guesting with Joan in a half-hour.”
Sylvie says she wants catch Bob sitting in with Joan.

1:41:30 – arrive at stage, Joan on stage singing Bob’s Farewell, Angelina
Joan gives Bob the finger.

1:43:00 – Joan brings Bob out – “Just fuck off and sing.”
Beautiful duet on It Ain’t Me Babe.
“It ain’t me you’re looking for, babe” and “I’m not the one you want, babe, I’ll only let you down” seems to resonate with Sylvie.  She realizes they’ve lost each other.

1:45:15 – Sylvie freaks out, runs from stage, Neuwirth runs after her, catches her by taxi.
She wants to go home – Neuwirth tells her she has to go to the ferry.
Bob & Joan are duetting Mama, You’ve Been on My Mind

1:46:09 – in motel room Bob tells Al Kooper to take off the shirt they just bought, “Take that shirt off. You look like a god-damn clown.”

Bob asks where Sylvie went, Neuwirth says she went to the ferry and “if you hurry you could catch her.”

1:46:26 – “The posse of purity” (Alan Lomax, Harold Leventhal & Theodore Bikel) come in the motel room door to talk to Bob.
The Kinks’ All Day and All of The Night is playing in the room.
Bob: “Where’s Pete?  He’s not in on this?”
Lomax:  “In on what exactly?”
Bob: “This posse of purity.”
Lomax: “Alright let’s just cut the crap, Bob.  Are you gonna be playing noise like this?”
Bob: [disgusted & dismissive] “This is The Kinks.”  😀
Alan Lomax verbally attacks Bob: “It was the Newport Folk Festival then, Bob, and it still is the Newport *Folk* Festival!  Not the teen dream, Brill Building, Top Forty British Invasion Festival – a *Folk* festival.  Do you even remember folk music, Bob?”
Bob: “No, what’s that?  Maybe you could sing me something.”

1:47:30 – Bob rushes on the motorcycle to the ferry to catch Sylvie.
Climactic scene btwn Bob & Sylvie at the fence —
Sylvia: “ It was fun to be on the carnival train with you, Bobby, but I think I gotta step off.  I feel like one of those plates, you know, that the French guy spins on those sticks on the Sullivan show.”
Bob: “Oh, I kinda like that guy.”
Sylvie: “I’m sure it’s fun to *be* the guy, Bob.  But I was a plate.”

Bob lights cigarette and passes it to her through the fence and asks her to stay.
Sylvie quotes Now, Voyager: “Don’t ask for the moon.  We have the stars.”

The last day of Newport ’65:

1:50:00 – Pete Seeger annoyingly comes in Bob’s motel room at 7AM!
Tells the parable of the teaspoon brigade.
Pete: “More and more people have been showing up, and they’re bringing their teaspoons.  Teaspoons for justice, and teaspoons for peace, and teaspoons for love, and that’s what we do.  And, gosh, you showed up, Bobby, and damn it, if you didn’t bring a shovel.”
Pete: “And tonight if you could just get up there one more time and use your shovel in the right way, you could level things out.”
Bob: “Use it in the right way?”
Pete: “You could level things out, Bob.”
Bob: “I sent you an advance of my new record.  Did you listen to the music you’re asking me not to play?”

Albert to Pete: “You’re pushing candles and he’s selling light bulbs.”
Bob walks out.

1:54:30 – Bob bumps into Johnny Cash at his car, blocking in Bob’s motorcycle.
Bob: “I’m not sure they wanna hear what I wanna play, Johnny.”
Johnny: “Who’s ‘they’?”
Bob: “You know, the men who decide what folk music is.”
Johnny tells Bob – “Well, fuck them. [whispers in his ear for emphasis] I wanna hear it.  Make some noise, B.D.  Track some mud on the carpet.“

1:56:40 – Bob, Neuwirth, Albert & band leave motel.

1:57:05 – Hammer Ring by black gospel group chopping wood on stage

1:58:15 – Lomax on stage introduces Dylan: “You want him, you can have him – Bob Dylan.”

1:58:40 – the band plugs in

1:58:55 – Bob & band start Maggies Farm
angry audience reaction
Pete & Joan frowning in the wings
Albert smiling

2:00:15 – Alan Lomex gets really angry — goes to soundboard to force them to turn it down
Neuwirth stops him
Albert & Lomax have fistfight (really happened)

2:01:15 – It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry
audience continues hostile reaction, throwing stuff
Pete says, “It’s enough.  Enough.”
2:02:10 – Pete goes to soundboard to tell them to turn it down.
Temporarily causes sound feedback distortion.
Pete looks at power cables and axes.
Toshi stops him.

2:03:00 – audience member yells, “Judas!  You’re Judas!”
Bob: “I don’t believe you.”

2:03:15 – “Play it loud.”  Like A Rolling Stone – Al’s phat B3 riff.
Audience throws stuff at the stage.

2:05:05 – Dylan and band leave stage.

Johnny Cash congratulates him: “Bobby!  You broke it down and blew my mind!”
Peter Yarrow goes out to microphone.
Albert to Bob: “Maybe you wanna go back out there and let out a little steam.”
Bob doesn’t want to. “We just ended the show.  It’s done.  Pack up.”

* 2:05:40 – Johnny Cash holds up acoustic guitar for Bob to take it.  “Go get ’em, killer.”

2:06:05 – Bob on stage – It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue

2:06:45: Pete to Lomax: “We’ll pull this back together.”
Lomax: “Together’s done, Pete.  Your boy just tore it down.”

2:07:05 – Albert: “How fast can we get him out of here?”
Neuwirth: “Like he was never here.”
Albert: (pause)  “Not that fast.” 🙂

2:08:00 – song ends, audience applauds, Bob leaves stage.
Bob & Neuwirth leave in car.

2:08:30 – Pete & Toshi arrive back at motel – huge balcony-filling party underway.

2:09:01 – Maria Muldaur moment.  She tells Pete, “I loved the show.”
Pete sees Bob in motel room all alone and somber while big party’s going on outside; he decides to leave him be.

2:09:35 – the morning after:
Joan comes to her motel room door, sees Bob leaving.

2:10:00 – Bob gets on his motorcycle
Joan approaches: “Let go of it Bobby, you won.”
Bob: “What did I win, Joan?”
Joan: “Freedom from all of us and our shit.  Isn’t that what you wanted.”

2:10:40 – Bob pauses to watch Pete folding up chairs.
As motorcycle starts to roar away, Pete looks up to see him driving off.

2:11:05 – Bob in Woody’s hospital room – Dusty Old Dust (So Long, It’s Been Good To Know Yuh) – the song that opened the movie – is playing on the record player – Bob plays harmonica to it.
Bob tries to give the harmonica back to Woody, but he pushes it back to Bob – somber solemn moment between the two.
Bob walks out to “So long, it’s been good to know yuh” playing.
Woody looks out his window to see Bob driving off.

2:13:05 – Bob seen riding motorcycle down the highway.

2:13:12 – movie ends – credits begin – Like A Rolling Stone blasts

 

 

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If you want more background on the movie, there’s a feature story on my site that goes into a lot of the background on it got made with lotsa production quotes and videos and details.

Or here’s an animated detailed account of Bob’s appearance at Woodstock ’94 — in a book about the whole festival from start to finish.

Here’s a detailed review of The Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa Oklahoma including lots of photos.

Here’s an account of being there at the Springsteen concert at Shea Stadium when Bob just Brice on stage.

Here’s a review of the Bob show at Kool House in Toronto in 2004.

Here’s a review of a killer Bob show at Copps Coliseum in Hamilton Ontario that felt like the ’70s.

Or here’s a great recent piece about The Benefits of Biopics.

 

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by Brian Hassett

karmacoupon@gmail.com   —  BrianHassett.com

Or here’s my Facebook page if you wanna join in there —

https://www.facebook.com/Brian.Hassett.Canada