Covered by Clapton, the Gunners and most of the buskers in downtown St. Pete, it’s easy to reject “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door†as a cliche. But that doesn’t diminish its subtle eloquence. Like most Dylan songs, his original remains the definitive version, the one that hits hardest and lingers longest.
He wrote “Heaven’s Door†for the scene where Slim Pickens’ character gets shot down in Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid, a flawed yet gripping film by director Sam Peckinpah that was met with mixed reviews in 1973. Dylan had a small role in the movie, which stars fellow songwriting titan Kris Kristofferson and James Coburn.
This article appears in Dec 26, 2007 – Jan 1, 2008.