Il était une fois James Dean

This is a TV biopic of James Dean. It starts with director Elia Kazan (Enrico Colantoni) egging Dean on as he keeps rubbing Raymond Massey the wrong way. Then it goes back to his childhood as he loses his beloved mother. His cold distant father Winton (Michael Moriarty) would abandon him to other family members. He would never get the approval from his father that he craves so much. He would ascend through the acting world in NYC and Hollywood as well.

I'm not a big enough Dean fan to know how much truth is in this picture. However there is no denying that James Franco is the perfect guy of his generation to play the guy. It's much more than mimicry. He is channeling his spirit somehow or at least his public persona. He is really the rebel without a cause. The production is OK for a TV movie. The style is old school and functional. Watch it for Franco's performance.

I watched this film with the idea I was going to hate it as I have all other attempts to recreate the life of James Dean, especially the one starring Casper Van Dien, which was deplorable. But the new TNT won me over more times than it missed. Without being aware, I discovered an occasional tear running down my cheek. James Franco did as well as anyone could to play James Dean. The times when he lost me were when Mark Rydell had him smile, full view with a horrible set of teeth. I realize this is picky, but if something is noticeable to break your concentration, then it is wrong. I wish Ted Turner had made this a two-nighter. There were scenes that could be expanded, especially with Lee Strasberg and Elia Kazan. I would've like to've seen more off-camera interaction between James and Julie Harris...and later on, when he became friends with Elizabeth Taylor and an enemy of Rock Hudson, two people that played predominant roles in the final days of James' life. Mark Rydell, who also directed, was marvelous a dead-ringer for Jack Warner. All and all I'd have to give it 2 1/2 stars out of four. It skimmed James's biography and could have had more depth, rather than playing on a sordid father-son relationship based on speculation. But thank God, Mark Rydell didn't spend to whole two hours exploiting James' relationship with Pier Angeli as the Van Dien version did, just to reinforce James Dean's preference for heterosexuality. I would love for Ted Turner to put out a three or four hour version of this same movie on DVD...I bet a lot of good scenes are lying on the editor's floor. All and all...pretty good show! (but could have been great without having to trim the movie for commercials).

James Franco gives a marvelous performance as the ultimate anti-hero James Dean. He not only looks like James Dean, he ACTS like James Dean. Michael Moriarty does a good job as James Dean's distant father. The rest of the cast gives solid performances. And the period recreation is realistic. My only complaint is that is the telemovie is a too short, but then again, so was James Dean's life. 8/10

I have been a fan of Jimmy Dean for over 18 years and I enjoyed this movie and i thought it gave a lot more and better detail than 'Race with Destiny' However, There were a few untruths in the movie, for one, Pier Angeli hated speed, and hated Jimmy driving the way he did, she slowed him down and by no means got in a car with him and helped him steer round a curve doing 50MPH! The movie didn't concentrate on this relationship enough considering it affected his life at the time and thereafter.

Secondly, there was a scene when Winton Dean told Jimmy that he was told by his dying wife Mildred that Jimmy may not be his, and thats why he's so distant. I have seen actual relatives of Dean throw their arms up in the air at disgust at this storyline, and completely deny that it ever happened. I've never read it anywhere and have no idea where they got this from. Maybe it was their interpretation of why Winton was cold, but if it was, its certainly a sensitive issue and they had no right to speculate!

Although i thought James Franco was brilliant (handsome too) and at some points in the movie i actually thought i was staring at Jimmy, Sometimes i thought he was made to look a complete dork. Jimmy did have problems because of the loss of his mother and spent his life trying to find the love he craved and missed out on when his mother died, he found this in Pier Angeli and when she left him, all his insecurities reared their ugly head again.

But all in the same breathe, It was great and i would recommend it to anyone to watch.

Mark Rydell's "James Dean" has some good things going for it. It also has some serious flaws because it ventured into areas which were completely speculative and inaccurate. Going for this TNT movie is the performance of young James Franco as James Dean. Franco's performance was more imitation than interpretation, but Franco had Dean's mannerisms and motions down pat. Michael Moriarity as Winton Dean and Sam Gould as Martin Landau also gave strong performances. The film captured the pathos of Dean's early life due to the death of his mother and rejection by his father-- emotional blows from which Dean never fully recovered. The "bad" and downright "ugly" about this production are the many glaring inaccuracies about Dean's life. Any serious Dean researcher could rip this production to shreds on that basis. (But I won't!) I'll even resist the temptation to write a laundry list of inaccuracies because I don't want to spoil this movie for anyone. (If you want to know, email me.)

I agree with others comments that this should have been a two part (or more) miniseries. With the plethora of commercials, the length couldn't have been more than 90 minutes of actual footage. Many interesting and important parts of Dean's life were given short shrift by this production. However, if this TV movie can ignite interest in Dean among people who have no idea about him, then it has served its purpose. I do hope that people will not take this Hollywood production at face value. Dean's real life was far more interesting than this production showed and he was a far more complex , talented, and tormented individual than he was depicted in this movie. I hope that this movie will serve as a springboard for others to discover through reading, viewing Dean's movies, and researching, the life of this fascinating American Icon.