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Review: Motion Picture Daily

CARRY IT ON

by Dick Yanni

Carry It On is a stunning black-and-white documentary which takes us from Lost Altos, California, where Joan Baez and her husband David Harris make their home, to San Francisco, Los Angles, Chicago, Detroit, Denver, Woodstock, Cambridge, Big Sur, Toronto, and New York. The film’s construction is simple and thoughtful – hypnotically visual and aural. We begin with the arrest of Harris at his home by Federal marshals. He is to begin a three-year sentence for refusing induction into the Army. After his arrest, Miss Baez goes on a concert tour alone. There are more than a dozen songs in Carry It On, all recorded live, which should please and delight her many fans.

But it is the lingering moments between the hectic cross-country tour, when we glimpse Miss Baez at home, in her kitchen, during bull sessions with students and admirers, waiting to go on the Joey Bishop show, and with her agent in a car between engagements, when we come to discover a surprisingly mature, engaging, wise, and totally disarming and unassuming young woman whose philosophy is not violent but thoughtful and dedicated.

The beauty of Miss Baez’ face, her intense love for life, and her perplexity at those who hold her up as a kind of “hero” of non-violent causes, become clear. But more surprising is the revelation of a young woman totally dedicated to her husband and their beliefs in the cause.

The film’s photography by James Coyne, Robert Jones and Christopher Knight is spellbinding. The editing by Jones and Knight is clearly a labor of love, as black-and-white images move before us with grace and style. Carry It On, even for those who do not share with Miss Baez and her husband the same political viewpoint, is a major film achievement which will linger in the minds eye for some time.

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