Rolling Thunder Revue

Martin Scorsese’s rollicking, star studded account of Bob Dylan’s iconic 1975 tour soon available on BluRay and DVD.

In 1975, in an America defined by both the self mythologizing pomp of the upcoming bicentennial and ongoing sociopolitical turmoil, Bob Dylan and a band of troubadours, including luminaries such as Joan Baez, Allen Ginsberg, and Joni Mitchell, embarked on a now legendary tour known as the Rolling Thunder Revue, a freewheeling variety show that was part traveling counterculture carnival, part spiritual pilgrimage.

Director Martin Scorsese blends behind the scenes archival footage, interviews, and narrative mischief, with a magician’s sleight of hand, into a zeitgeist defining cultural record that is as much a concert documentary as it is a slippery, chimerical investigation into memory, time, truth, and illusion.

At the center of it all is the magnetic Dylan, a sphinxlike philosopher poet singing, with electrifying conviction, to the soul of an anxious nation.

Sony Pictures, January 25th, 2021.