Bob Dylan as Filmmaker: No Time to Think

Bob Dylan as Filmmaker, the first book of its kind, opens up exciting new ways to think about the artistry of Bob Dylan. It offers a captivating exploration into movies that, according to Michael, showcase Bob Dylan not just as a subject, but as the primary author. These include Eat the Document―a short, experimental television film shot in 1966 and released in 1972; the sprawling, genre-blurring epic Renaldo and Clara (1978), both directed by Dylan himself; and the darkly surreal Masked and Anonymous (2003), directed by Larry Charles but co-written by and starring Dylan. Bob Dylan as Filmmaker explores what these movies reveal about “how it feels” to be Bob Dylan during three defining eras of his career: the revolutionary 1960s, the introspective 1970s, and the enigmatic early 2000s. Just as crucially, they illuminate Dylan’s remarkable instinct for using film not merely as a medium, but as a deeply personal mode of expression.

The book also provides an essential survey of Dylan’s most recent movie projects, including those by other directors, in which Dylan’s influence is less overt but no less powerful. Here, Michael argues that Dylan operates as a kind of “invisible co-author”: in Martin Scorsese’s Rolling Thunder Revue (2019), where Dylan appears as a slippery, self-mythologizing interviewee; Alma Har’el’s haunting Shadow Kingdom (2021), a stylized livestream performance; and James Mangold’s A Complete Unknown (2024), the Timothée Chalamet-led biopic shaped in part by Dylan’s behind-the-scenes “script approval.”

‘I didn’t ask to be dubbed the ‘Dean of Dylanologists’—it was the unintended byproduct of my deep, intense study of the work of Bob Dylan. I’ve long told anyone who will listen that Dylan’s films and interest in film are essential to gaining a better understanding of his art. In an era of performative hot takes, I recognize a kindred spirit in Michael Glover Smith. Bob Dylan as Filmmaker reflects that rare combination of the director’s eye and the curator’s exactitude (the appendices are stupendous). Bob Dylan is already studied like Shakespeare and Smith’s book is a foundational text on Dylan and cinema.’ Scott Warmuth, writer and disc jockey

‘This is an excellent read that shines a light on an underappreciated aspect of Bob Dylan’s creativity, which reflectively also illuminates the rest of his work.’

Laura Tenschert host of the Definitely Dylan podcast

‘Despite the vast literature on Bob Dylan, his work as a filmmaker remains critically underexplored. Michael Glover Smith, himself an innovative and thought-provoking filmmaker, remedies this gap with a perceptive and rigorously informed study of Dylan’s cinematic output…Insightful, unique, and long overdue, this book is an essential addition to Dylan studies.’

Andrew Muir, author of The True Performing of It: Bob Dylan and William Shakespeare

’Michael Glover Smith’s Bob Dylan as Filmmaker is the most compelling reconsideration of Bob Dylan’s work as a filmmaker written to date. Building on previous analyses of Dylan’s films, Smith combines his own experiences as a filmmaker with his extensive research and deft analysis of Dylan’s films to prove how Dylan’s process is similar regardless of the genre he creates in – grounded in tradition, innovative, and true to his artistic vision. In this way, Smith successfully challenges the paradigm that Dylan failed as a filmmaker by methodically chronicling the films that influenced Dylan and how those films shaped the movies Dylan made. Smith’s approach positions Dylan as an artist working in the medium of film rather than, as he has been previously understood, a musician making movies. Bob Dylan as Filmmaker: No Time to Think advances the conversation of Dylan as an holistic artist and is an essential addition to anyone’s Dylan library.

Erin C. Callahan, author of The Politics and Power of Bob Dylan's Live Performances

‘From the influence of everyone from John Ford to Rainer Werner Fassbinder to his own fascinating forays into filmmaking, Bob Dylan's deep and abiding love of cinema is a fascinating prism through which to contemplate his kaleidoscopic career. In his wonderful new overview Bob Dylan As Filmmaker: No Time To Think, Michael Glover Smith takes us on an immersive journey through the duality between Dylan's music and the screen imagery that clearly preoccupies so much of his mind. A delightful and rigorous read, and a crucial contribution to the canon of Dylan literature.’

Elizabeth Nelson, singer-songwriter for garage-punk band the Paranoid Style, and a regular contributor to the Ringer, the Oxford American, the New York Times Magazine, and Pitchfork, among others

‘Even among fans, Bob Dylan's work as a filmmaker is easy to mock or ignore. In Bob Dylan as Filmmaker: No Time To Think, Michael Glover Smith persuasively defends Dylan's artistic vision (if not always his acting). Through meticulous analysis augmented by his own original research in the Dylan archives, Smith explains what the movies mean and what other films Dylan drew inspiration from. I'll give it the highest praise possible: It made me want to watch Renaldo and Clara again.’ Ray Padgett, author of Pledging My Time: Conversations with Bob Dylan Band Members