SEE Magazine
Issue #393: June 14, 2001
Copyright © 2001. All Rights Reserved

On Screen REVIEW by Peter North Ballad of Ramblin’ Jack June 15 - 18, 7 & 9 p.m. Metro Cinema Zeidler Hall, Citadel Theatre *** (out of five) There’s a great line early on in The Ballad of Ramblin’ Jack when Ramblin’ Jack Elliott is telling a story about when he was a runaway who ended up joining the Colonel Jim Eskew Ranch Rodeo. When asked by one of the hired hands where he’s from, an ashamed 14-year-old Elliott admits he’s from Brooklyn, hardly the capitol of cowpunchers and cutting horse riders. "It’s not where you’re from that’s important, it’s where you’re going," said the hand to Elliott, who took those words to heart and set out to become one of the most important figures in the history of American folk music. Too bad Ramblin’ Jack’s daughter Aiyana didn’t heed those words when she was shooting and cutting this film that was honored with a Special Jury Prize for Artistic Achievement at the Sundance Film Festival last year. Telling the story of this wandering minstrel, the main disciple of Woody Guthrie, and a major influence on Bob Dylan, should and could have been enough for Ms. Elliott. However, as a woman who felt abandoned by her father, she tried to weave her personal frustrations and new perspectives on her parents’ failed marriage into the work and ended up with a disjointed film that spends much of the final 50 minutes aimlessly drifting from the folk singer’s world to hers and back, never coming up with the answers she was hoping to find. Thankfully the top of the film does find its feet, and a interesting path, that invites us into Elliott’s world which just got bigger by the day after he hit his mid-teens. We’re treated to glimpses of his not particularly happy family life through old home movies and interviews with a very frank aunt and his brother. His fascination with cowboy life and folk music unfolds as if it was predestined and footage of him hanging with the Woody Guthrie, performing in England in the late ’50s to adoring audiences, and vintage footage of other folk pioneers all hangs together comfortably. Clips featuring Guthrie singing I Ain’t Got No Home or playing in a barn with Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee are priceless, as is a performance of Elliott charging into Jimmy Rogers’ Muleskinner Blues as the great Norman Blake accompanies him. Dropping the ball on certain topics becomes Aiyana’s forte as the movie progresses. Elliott’s up-and-down friendship with Bob Dylan is left hanging on a falling out in the ’60s, even though a brief clip from The Rolling Thunder Revue in the early ’70s suggests the two patched it up briefly. The film crew made a trip with Elliott to Elko, Nevada for the annual Cowboy Poetry Gathering and easily could have given us better insights through the eyes of his peers concerning his importance in that scene. Clips with Aiyana’s mother Martha, Elliott’s fourth wife, serve a purpose early on but quickly become redundant. On the flip side comments from Arlo Guthrie, Kris Kristofferson and Dave Van Ronk open up the shutter wide on their friend and peer. It’s also unfortunate that the director didn’t seek out Guy Clark and include his hilarious musical portrait of Elliott, Ramblin’ Jack and Mahon, in the soundtrack, or shoot any of the sessions when Elliott was cutting his 1998 Grammy-winning Friends of Mine that found him singing with Clark, Tom Waits, Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead, Emmylou Harris and John Prine. In the end this is a film that a new edit could elevate from somewhat frustrating status to that of very good, but despite the flaws one can’t help but recommend it to any serious student of folk music and all fans of Ramblin’ Jack. It’s not like there are any other cinematic options concerning this fascinating man.

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