bobby

Bobby - that's what all of his friends, contemporaries and - it seems - all the hangers-on, called him. Robert Zimmerman from Hibbins, Minnesota is a fascinating and in many ways infuriating character. Infuriating because he refuses to be pinned down, characterised, defined. He has always defined himself in any way that pleased him or served him.

Martin Scorsese's documentary, "No Direction Home" is a fantastic piece of film making. Apart from some mind boggling archival footage, there is a long face-to-face interview intercut throughout the movie, in which Dylan speaks bluntly and yet never reveals anything substantial. He doesn't speak about his parents. He speaks a little bit about his home town and about the music he listened to as a kid. He never smiles. His assertivness and his measured speech are striking. He never really explains anything beyond saying: "That's how I wanted it to be". A truly mesmerizing guy. I thought that it was Scorsese himself who interviewed Dylan for the movie but it turns out that the two actually never met. The interviewer is never shown in the film.

In the archival clips Dylan performs night after night with his electric band to boos and abuse from the crowd that wants to hear him strum his acoustic guitar and sing "protest" songs. There's Dylan mercilessly shredding hapless reporters who ask the most inane questions and have the most bizzare requests (one asks him to suck on his sunglasses) Always elusive, his performances always riveting. In his review, Roger Ebert likened Dylan's singing to a preacher's sermon - absolutely right on the money!

In the 60's Dylan was cast into the role of a spokesman for a generation but he never wanted to be one. He refused to follow the rules of accepted societal behaviour (becoming a "protest" singer) but then he refused to follow the rules of the radical left that had so eagerly adopted him. Dylan never followed anyone's rules. He remains an enigmatic genius till this day. And, at the age of 64, he still looks and sounds as cool and as hip as he did in the early 60's. No one boos him now!

No Direction Home is a truly outstanding document