A Portrait of James Dean: Joshua Tree, 1951 [DVD]

Very often we see James Dean portrayed as the young rebel, a rebel yes but one that still does fit in our conventional conceptions. This movie clearly dares to tell the other story, know by many told by only a few. And James Preston does portrait him very nicely. One can practically feel the hunger and hurt for love.

Fantastic fifties atmosphere a must see

Unusual this. A Film about James Dean who was, at best, sexually ignorant. He wanted it every which way. Whatever, he got it but sadly died young. A good DVD.

a bit slow and turgid in parts, wonder what held em back from just going for it.

No my style of documentary

.. version of the James Dean story ...covering only his sexuality !! if you loved `Brokeback mountain` i guess you`ll like this ? ..for the rest of us it`s just tedious !

Well lit b/w movie about the early years of James Dean. But the story doesn't seem to progress much. Boring.

A beautifully shot film that tackles James Dean's sexuality head on.The soundtrack is wonderful and I wish I could find it!

This is a must have for any. James Dean fan because it is in black and white it lends a great deal of reality to the subject. Now that I have it I don't know why I went so long without adding it to my collection

J'ai adoré ! James Preston tellement crédible dans le rôle de James Dean. Le film me ravit par sa grande beauté et me séduit par son intelligence. Une réflexion sur le cinéma et sur une icône inoubliable. Un bijou splendide du 7ème art. Un rêve sur le rêve américain du cinéma. A voir absolument !

a dreamy, experimental film experience. lacking in plot direction and filling in details with more than a little artistic license, this film is still a fun experience for anybody who was a fan of James Dean and his iconic life.

DVD superbe !!!Merci beaucoup,acteurs fantastiques, une vie absolument interressante et une superbe realisation, je le conseille vivement a tout le mondeRemy COCQUELET

While Mishory's film moves slowly and has little to no plot, he creates a beautifully impressionistic film that gives what is likely the most accurate impression of James Dean ever rendered. Instead of going in a biographical direction - most of which Dean fans know anyway - Mishory creates the essence of Dean in the way Monet, for example, created the essence of water lilies, using bits and pieces, sometimes seemingly unconnected, to provide an overall more realistic impression. I think Mishory asked, How do I present a portrait of James Dean that reveals a more truthful or close-to-home vision of him than a strictly biographical film would? And I think he answered this question exceptionally well with "Joshua Tree, 1951" - by using, with film, the techniques used by the great painters of Impressionism.I've never been fascinated by Dean himself (though I think he was brilliant in the three films by which we know him), but more by the iconic aura that developed around him after his death. This aura remains today, in the same way it remains around Monroe or Garland. So I AM fascinated by the reasons behind this status given to the three of them and a very few others. Why these few? Untimely death, perhaps. But Monroe and Garland didn't die as young as Dean did. River Phoenix died young, but he still hasn't gained an equally iconic aura. The only conclusion I've come to at this point is that the reason we cast this aura on so few actors - which we do; we GIVE them the aura --- has to do with a combination of things. One is our knowledge of their personal lives, true or false; all the tabloid guesses and theories, the stresses and strains, the peccadilloes, the misfit quality of them. Another is the vision of them provided by the camera. We often hear that Monroe, especially, made love, in a way, to movie cameras, as though she had a direct and very strong understanding of cameras, almost a relationship with them, and always knew instinctively how to appear in front of them to put across her beauty, her talent, and large parts of her personality and persona: her innocence, her vulnerability. Watching all three of them in their films, we the audience feel that we KNOW them, very personally. We feel that they're talking to us, to each of us individually. We connect to them in a way we don't often connect to most actors. Gloria Swanson, I think, achieves this in "Sunset Boulevard" - and we'd likely cast a similar aura around her had she done this in a greater number of films. Garland was able to do this even in brief moments. Watch "Over the Rainbow" and "The Man That Got Away" again - really WATCH them - and ask yourself to whom she's singing. It's to you, isn't it? It IS! But guess what? It's to every other person sitting in that theater, too, and each of them would answer this question the same way: she's singing to me.So, again, how do you make a film about any of these icons that, instead of presenting a dry biography with no sense of the person behind the icon, instead presents the person behind the icon? You head in the direction of Impressionism.I came away from this film feeling that I'd met and had a beer or a glass of wine with Dean, and that I'd gotten to know HIM as opposed to the iconic image of him on the movie screen. And with that, I felt that I had at least a few hints as to why we later cast that iconic aura around him.This is not a film for everyone. Even staunch Dean fans may run to it with great excitement and come away disappointed. It is a slow-moving film because it lacks a direct, linear story, a beginning, a middle, and an end. But anyone who enjoys films with an impressionistic bent (I think of Tom Ford's "A Single Man" - though it has a stronger, more direct story) should enjoy "Joshua Tree" for the same reasons I did.