Masked & Anonymous

Masked & Anonymous is a film written by Bob Dylan and directed by Larry Charles, though they both credited themselves as writers under pseudonyms Sergei Petrov and Rene Fontaine. It was filmed in just twenty days; utilizing digital video, Larry Charles was able to shoot up to eight pages of script a day.

Related Topics:
Bob Dylan - Larry Charles

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The movie has been noted for its large cast of celebrities, who all took cuts in pay just to work with Dylan. The film opens in an anonymous nation, plagued by civil war and poverty, geographically resembling a part of America close to Mexico, where racial divisions have disappeared: Latinos, Anglo-Saxons, blacks, Asians, and others, all intermingle in this place. Some have interpreted this setting as a future America; others see it as an alternate present-day America. Either way, it is meant to be highly symbolic of Dylan's vision of the world.

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John Goodman plays Uncle Sweetheart, a scheming concert-promoter in debt over his head. He is working with Nina Veronica (Jessica Lange) to produce a "benefit concert for the real victims of this war." In reality, he is only planning to keep the money and escape his debtors.

Related Topics:
John Goodman - Jessica Lange

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To pull this off, he gets his old friend Jack Fate (Bob Dylan) out of prison. Fate agrees to play the benefit, but his reasons for playing are not driven by money: he views himself as a musician whose job it is to play music.

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There is much symbolism in the film that has yet to be seriously discussed. Almost universally bad reviews stalled any possible discussion of what place this film holds in the corpus of Dylan's work. On one hand, the film is political: it describes how Dylan sees the political landscape (people fighting for no reason, a nation without hope, governments that can not be trusted) but at the same time Dylan makes it clear that "he is only a singer and maybe nothing else." He produces no solutions to any of the problems the film presents. Rather, he makes it clear that he "stopped trying to figure everything out a long time ago."

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Music from Dylan's entire career is presented in the movie, though his recent album Time Out Of Mind receives considerable play, with "Dirt Road Blues" and "Not Dark Yet" both used as background soundtrack music in scenes; Dylan also plays a very upbeat version of "Cold Irons Bound" in the film's climax. Furthermore, a live performance of "Standing in the Doorway" was cut from the final edit, but included as a bonus on the DVD.

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