Scorsese's new and upcoming documentaries
No Direction Home, his Bob Dylan documentary, was thought to get no theatrical release, but thankfully it was recently included in Toronto's festival lineup, in the 'Masters' section. The festival runs from Sep. 8 to Sep. 15 This is the festival's website This is the complete lineup A few days later, it is scheduled to air in two parts, on PBS and BBS on Sep. 26 & 27. You can see a trailer here and here for slow connections --------------------------------- This story now claims that his previously announced Elia Kazan documentary might be gearing up for production. According to Film Comment editor-at-large and longtime Scorsese collaborator Kent Jones, the Kazan film has been in the planning stages for well over a year—and is not too far from getting cameras rolling. "We're shooting the first interviews pretty soon, and we're writing it, but really, we're at the beginning of it," Jones told The Reeler. "It's only recently that we've gotten some money locked in place for it. I've certainly been researching pretty heavily and contacting people. The names are probably the names of people you could guess: Budd Schulberg, Eli Wallach, Karl Malden. And you know, there is a lot of material to draw from, too. His autobiography is very rich; his papers are all collected at Wesleyan." Scorsese made waves in 1999 when he and Robert De Niro presented an honorary Academy Award to Kazan, a former Communist who had cooperated with the House Un-American Activities Committee's investigations of the film industry nearly 50 years earlier. The Oscar was Kazan's third, following Best Director honors for both 1948's Gentleman's Agreement and 1954's On the Waterfront. Look for Scorsese and Jones to address all of these issues in their feature-length film, but be patient—Jones would not go into detail about a possible release timeline or distribution deal. Alas, there is always Toronto '06.

Excitement!!!
8) Thanks will! I already have the Dylan docu on my calendar for 9/26 & 27. I love the Scorsese & The Band collaboration "The Last Waltz". It's one of the best...maybe The Best...music films ever made, imo. Fantastic performances and amazing talk between Scorsese and the musicians. So I'm really looking forward to "No Direction Home". Thanks for the extra links for the festival, line-up and trailer! The Elia Kazan docu sounds interesting too. I'll keep watching for it, unless you bring us news about it first... which you probably will, will :!: Thanks again

I wanted to add an update about the No Direction Home documentary. Variety reports that it will get a limited theatrical release: Dealin' for Dylan Toronto fest off to fast start TORONTO -- The Toronto Film Fest kicks off today, but some major wheeling-and-dealing has already begun. Martin Scorsese's fest entry "No Direction Home: Bob Dylan," which clocks in at almost four hours, will get a theatrical run courtesy of Gotham-based indie Emerging Pictures. Plan is to roll out the pic digitally in 30 cities nationwide before its skedded TV and homevid debut later this month. The film however will not screen for the full week making it ineligible for Oscar consideration. Screenings, which run the week of Sept. 20, will be free of charge to the public on a first-come basis. Pic is being released on DVD via Paramount Home Video on the same date. Emerging, which operates a consortium of digital projection theatres, was co-founded by Ira Deutchman, Barry Rebo and Giovanni Cozzi. Trio earlier this year released another high-profile docudocu, Ken Burns' "Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson. Dylan project marks an expansion of Emerging's burgeoning digital cinema model: Company released the Burns docu in just 10 markets. Dylan docu is screening in Toronto's Masters section on Sept. 17. Thirteen/WNET will subsequently air "Home" as part of its "American Masters" series, in two parts, on Sept. 26 and 27. Pic was created through Spitfire PicturesSpitfire Pictures, Grey Water Park Prods., Sikelia Prods., Vulcan Prods., BBC and NHK. "Home" follows Dylan's life and music from 1961 through 1966. The Bob Dylan Archives made available to Scorsese rare Dylan footage, including excerpts from Murray Lerner's "Festival," which captured perfs at the 1963, 1964 and 1965 Newport Folk Fests. Also included are previously unreleased outtakes from D.A. Pennebaker's "Don't Look Back," as well as interviews with Allen Ginsberg, Pete Seeger, Joan Baez and others. ...................... :D

The film however will not screen for the full week making it ineligible for Oscar consideration. Now the question is whether this theatrical exhibition makes Scorsese ineligible for an Emmy. Apparently not. Here's an excerpt from page 8 of the official Emmy rule book... From Tuesday, here's a David Poland comment about the recently-finished Telluride Film Festival... Perhaps the best loved, if not best attended, surprise of the fest was a one-time showing of the PBS doc directed by Martin Scorsese. No Direction Home: Bob Dylan. If one person wondered aloud why the film wasn't getting a theatrical release, a hundred did. Apparently, PBS paid the lion's share of the production costs and demanded to be the premiere outlet for the film. Not many distributors were interested in distributing a film after it's played on TV, followed by a quick DVD release. Oh well... The film will play one more fest, Toronto, before the PBS playdate. I look forward to catching the film on a big screen while up there.

Thanks Arnzilla. ...or in limited release for the purpose of fulfilling awards eligibility (e.g., The Oscars) The problem is that the limited release they're giving it will not make it eligible for the Oscars, since it won't run for a week. Therefore it doesn't match the exception to the Emmy rule. They should just add a couple days to its run and make it eligible for both.

Dylan docu
The film had its NY premiere tonight - Leonardo attended as well as Mr & Mrs Scorsese, Al Cooper, Jim Jarmusch, Ellen Barkin.

Jeffrey Wells had an accident in his pants over the Dylan doc, calling parts of it better than Lawrence of Arabia, of all things.

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well, Jeffrey Wells is an idiot as usual. Why is he comparing a documentary to a non-documentary drama?

Jeff Wells: In a way he lets the story tell itself, but he also frames Dylan's saga in the same way David Lean configured the life of T.E. Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia. This analogy originated with screenwriter Larry Gross in a Movie City News posting after he caught No Direction Home at the Telluride Film Festival, and it's absolutely right-on. This movie is, in a sense, Scorsese's Lawrence of Arabia, and without losing control of my faculties I have to say that here and there it's more breathtaking and lump-in-the-throat terrific than Lean's version. Part One, which lasts two hours, is about becoming...about Dylan's absorbing all he could and summoning his many strengths, and it ends with his triumphant performance at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival...when Dylan had reached the summit of his powers as the penultimate poet and folk singer of his day. Part Two, which covers '63 to '66, is about the complications that came from Dylan's shifting away from his acoustic roots and embracing his electrified destiny with "Bringing It All Back Home," "Highway 61 Revisited" and "Blonde on Blonde"...complications and pressures that involved accusations of being a "traitor" to folk music and having to deal with repulsively stupid questions from middle-aged journalists. It all got thicker and gnarlier and finally led to a kind of downfall (his July 1966 motorycle accident, which...who knows?...might have occured for reasons other than mere chance) and a withdrawal from touring that lasted for eight or nine years. "I must have been mad, I never knew what I had"...I can't nail this film in a Word item, but do not miss it. No Direction Home: Bob Dylan is easily one of the finest and most moving films of the year, and one of the most profound rock docs ever. Larry Gross: When Part One (two hours in length) of No Direction Home ended with footage of Dylan's triumphant appearance onstage at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival with Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, Odetta, Oscar Brand, and Peter Paul and Mary, the only thing I could compare the stunning emotional effect to was the conclusion of Part One of Lawrence of Arabia: Lawrence and his army of rag tag Bedouins taking Aquaba from the Turkish oppressor. Dylan, we have learned by this point, has completed one stage in an intricate journey of self-creation and become the troubadour-folksinger-songwriting voice of his generation railing against injustice-just as Lawrence has proven by a succession of heroic acts of bravery to his Arab colleagues that he is uniquely capable of shaping his own destiny "that truly for some men nothing is written unless they write it themselves." The analogy in theme, between Scorsese's achievement and that of Lean and Bolt holds up in another key regard. Both films show a self-mythologizing hero whose charisma and sheer creative power, give him influence over others that he is never entirely comfortable with. One of the great things about Lawrence, as opposed to all other biopics, is that we see the hero's personality spell over and reshape the lives of other memorable characters. As Ginsberg, Baez, Van Ronk et al. discuss Dylan, the same thing take happens here. In No Direction Home, as in Lawrence of Arabia, Part Two is partly about the undoing of the man who triumphs in the first part of the film. The Dylan of Part Two feels trapped in the role of the genius-messiah-shaman supposedly gifted with all the artistic, political and spiritual answers, even as the centre does not hold in the wider society of the mid-sixties. The bitter replaying of"Hard Rain's Gonna Fall," to footage of JFK's assassination, has Scorsese doing in less than two minutes almost what Oliver Stone took three hours to do. Scenes displaying Dylan's contempt for press demands that he come up with soundbites to sum up all the problems of youth and an American society that was in ever more savage conflict, are as funny, refreshing and needed as they were forty years ago.

Dylan
I'm sure Mr. Scorsese's film is fantastic with or without Wells endorsement - another documentary on Dylan made years ago by DA Pennebaker (sp?) Don't Look Back is one of the best ones I've ever seen.

It's available on amazon to pre-order.

Thanks for the reviews Arnzilla. Praise indeed! :D To me Dylan has always been a strange character. Never quite sure which side of the fence he is on! :? Certainly had talent but there was something else about him. Must see this movie to see if I can unravel the conundrum! :) Sounds like Scorsese worked his usual magic in a LONG story.

Thanks Arnzilla The reviews so far have all been very positive, so I'm very excited to see it! Especially the Manchester Free Trade Hall (Judas) Scene. It might bring a few locals who were there out of the woodwork. I big screen release here would be great but I've heard nothing of it so far. Instead I'm booking my place in front of the TV those two nights! Shynney I've always had mixed feelings about his work too but this might change all that. :wink:

NDH
Zilla... Thanks for posting the reviews. I've been a fan of Bob Dylan's for a long time. BEYOND GREAT lyrics. And I just finished reading Chronicles a few months ago. So...I'm definitely psyched to see NDH. Courtney... Yeah...Don't Look Back is one of the best music docus I've ever seen. LOVE that movie.