An intellectual whirligig lacking depth or soul, I'm Not There is designed for Bob Dylan fans turned on by spotting allusions to the iconic musician's immense, revered body of work. For the rest of us, though, Todd Haynes's expertly executed but hollow exercise in imaginative biography reveals next to nothing about Dylan, the essence of whom the director seeks to capture through an ersatz-kaleidoscopic narrative focused on six fictional variations of Dylan's personas. To borrow terms coined by Werner Herzog, Haynes is after an "essential truth" as opposed to the point-by-point "accountant's truth" for which biopics typically strive, one in which the singer-songwriter's incarnations are cast as simultaneously made-up and authentic. Profound or poignant insights, however, are seldom conveyed by the film's carousel of sketchy Dylan stand-ins, be it Christian Bale's earnest Greenwich Village folk troubadour, Heath Ledger's self-involved counterculture actor, Ben Whishaw's insufferable poet, Richard Gere's Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid retired outlaw, or Cate Blanchett's plugged-in late'-60s rock n' roll rebel.