The entertainment and gossip columnist Roger Friedman writes more about “Factory Girl” today. He likes the movie. He acknowledges that it is very far from being accurate in its facts, but, then, what is truth?

It´s unlikely, for example, that Edie had an affair with Bob Dylan. In the movie, Hayden Christensen, whom I´ve accused of being wooden in the past, does a great job playing a Dylanesque character named Billy Quinn. Dylan didn´t want his name used, but it´s him, right down to the harmonica. Dylan should be flattered. He comes across as hot stuff and never looked better.

But Edie´s real affair was with Dylan associate Bob Neuwirth. She lived with him for two years, but he´s not in the movie. Some books about Edie and Dylan suggest they may have had a fling, but only Dylan knows and he´s not telling.

Dylan, of course, is famous for not owning up to his personal life. He likes to keep secret the number of children he had (after his initial four with wife Sara Lownds) and the names of their mothers. When I reported a few years ago that he´d romanced Raquel Welch in recent times, he denied it even though it was true.

But what is true? Biographical films no longer stick to any truth. Characters are combined, incidents are rearranged. “Facts” are reinterpreted so the plot moves along better. “Fur,” this year´s movie about photographer Diane Arbus, was billed as an “imaginary portrait.”

Well, you might say that that last paragraph of Friedman’s makes a good point, and all the more so in the light of Dylan’s cooperation with the forthcoming Todd Haynes film, “I’m Not There” — which certainly is not going to be following history in any faithful way. However, therein lies the real point. No one is going to watch “I’m Not There” — with multiple actors and actresses playing Dylan at various stages — and think that they are seeing a documentary of any kind. They will be far more likely to realize that they are watching something which is an artistic creation in its own right, and is merely utilizing the character of Dylan and some of the stories of his life as a jumping off point to create a discrete piece of work.

“Factory Girl,” on the other hand, is apparently a film which would have us think that it is telling the real story of real people. And it pretty clearly is doing no such thing.

By the way, I don’t know if Friedman’s assertions above about Bob Neuwirth or anything else are true either — but then, what is truth? (I do think Bob and Raquel would make a great couple, but that’s their business.)

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Speaking of the Todd Haynes picture, the publication Jewtastic has this item about Cate Blanchett (who is one of those portraying Dylan in that upcoming film):

“Bob Dylan´s persona is divided into six different parts,” she says. “ I play Bob Dylan when he went electric, so I had the hair. It´s not a biopic. I think when you kind of juxtapose all those different incarnations you get an approximation of him.”

Blanchett also revealed her admiration for the folk rock star.

“‘Cause he´s so elusive, and I´m so in love with him and I´m so glad I never met him – I´d be terrified! My brother-in-law met him,” she says. “He was at a party in LA about 15 years ago and he was talking to this really cool guy. They had shared a joint and after he left, everyone came up to my brother-in-law and said, ‘How do you know Bob?´ and he said, ‘Bob, who?´ He thought he was talking to the gardener!”

I suspect that Dylan would be far more pleased to hear that he was mistaken for a gardener, as opposed to hearing Roger Friedman characterizing him as “hot stuff.”

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