Usually, when I am viewing a biopic, I am looking for some insight into the person being portrayed on screen. This is especially important to me when the subject of the film is someone whose art I am drawn to and enjoy in my daily life. I want to know a little about the behind-the-scenes creation of that art and what made it so appealing to the masses and, more importantly, to me. So it comes as a great surprise, then, that a film like A Complete Unknown comes along, gives me none of that, yet I like it as much as I do. Perhaps Bob Dylan is just one of those enigmatic figures that works best when we don’t see the gears working behind all of that talent. Maybe seeing behind the curtain would take away from the mystique that is the man, the myth, the legend. Maybe director James Mangold understood that to try and define that would be to do the subject a disservice. Either way, the film he delivered won’t enlighten you to the hows and whys, yet it works on its own level. This is a film about Bob Dylan, but it’s also a film about folk music, and if you can meet it on that level, you are in for an interesting, sometimes enigmatic, ride.
The film opens up with Bob Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) arriving in New Jersey with just a backpack and a guitar. He is there to see his idol, Woody Guthrie (Scoot McNairy), who has recently been hospitalized with a debilitating disease that has left him unable to speak. When he arrives, he sees that Guthrie has a visitor, Pete Seeger (Edward Norton), another American folk singer-songwriter, and the only person who seems to visit Woody in the hospital anymore. Woody and Pete listen while Bob performs a song he wrote for Woody, and it becomes apparent that they are in the presence of something special. Pete offers to house Bob for a while and introduce him to the folk music scene in New York City’s Greenwich Village.
It doesn’t take long for Bob to prove himself, performing in some intimate bars and clubs, even impressing established folk musician Joan Baez (Monica Barbaro), who has a loyal following but tries too hard when it comes to writing her own material. Bob meets Sylvie Russo (Elle Fanning) at a concert, and she is immediately attracted to his candor and contrarian opinions. It isn’t long before he has moved in with her; but his ambitions get the better of him, and when she is out of the country, he has an affair with Joan Baez. Meanwhile, his star is rising as he experiments with his music, eventually betraying his folk music roots by introducing electric guitars and a full band into his sound. This shift in style alienates his friends and co-workers, who see this as a betrayal of authentic folk music, and things come to blows when he refuses to regress back to his older material for the Newport Folk Festival.
There is a fine line between delivering an honest performance and simply doing an impersonation. This becomes a difficult line to traverse when the person you are portraying is not only extremely famous but still very much in the public eye. As of this writing, Bob Dylan is still touring the world and making public appearances. I had a chance to see him on stage just two years ago but couldn’t make the schedule work, something I still regret. There are two ways to tackle this kind of role: make it your own or slavishly recreate the person and events that are already readily available to see elsewhere. The best actors find a way to marry the two into a third option, one that is so accurate it is scary while at the same time not losing the heart through the attempt for authenticity. Timothée Chalamet has managed that. I have seen this actor several times over the last few years, and while he is usually a welcome presence, I generally have never been that impressed with his performances. That changed last night as I sat in the theater and was blown away by the way he transformed himself into Bob Dylan, and when he starts singing, it’s almost like you’re hearing the real deal…almost.
Timothée nails the mannerisms of the musician, but he doesn’t let that dictate all of the choices he makes, bringing him to life on the screen. There are still moments when the actor slips through, especially early on, but this is not a fault of the performance. These are deliberate choices made by the actor to make this performance his own. By the time Bob Dylan’s star starts to rise, we see a shift in his character as he becomes more distanced and less warm. He becomes more like the Bob Dylan we know from decades in the spotlight. He starts wearing sunglasses all the time and trying to be emotionally checked out, even when he is obviously interested in something. He also starts to get less comfortable whenever he is recognized in public, fleeing whenever people get excited to be in his presence.
As good as Chalamet is, though, Edward Norton is matching him, beat for beat. We first see his character, Pete Seeger, defending his rights in court to perform a patriotic song for the wrong group of people, the Commies. This is the early sixties, after all, and nothing could be more scandalous than being linked to the Communist Party. This plot point is mainly there to show us Pete’s true character, a folk musician loyalist who sees music as a means to unite people and bring about change. His views and emotions on the subject put him at odds with Dylan later in the picture when he feels betrayed by the direction Dylan is taking.
James Mangold has painted a portrait of a time in history that really isn’t all that long ago. My parents lived through it and could tell me stories, even though they grew up far away from the folk scene developing in the big cities. What Mangold has done is craft a feel for the period. He’s not particularly interested in sticking closely to established fact and takes many liberties with what really happened, but instead he focuses on the emotional state of the country, the characters, and the music. By doing so, he may anger the purists who lived through it and remember things playing out differently. He’s not making his picture for those people. He’s making this picture for people like me who want to bask in the ambience of the cultural shift while enjoying some pretty darn good music. Did I want to get more insight into the creation of that music? Sure. But I also enjoyed just hearing it in the context of the time it was being written and performed.
Bob Dylan is one of those performers who has a very vocal and rabid fan base. Judging from the reaction this film is getting, it seems that the bigger fan of Dylan you are, the less you will like this film. I’ve heard it referred to as high-quality karaoke, and to a degree, it is. I’m a fan of Bob Dylan’s popular songs. I’ve never done a deep dive into his back catalog, and thus this film hit with me. It’s superficial, for sure, and it never even attempts to get behind the mind that made the music. We learn nothing from his past before he shows up in New York aside from a brief mention of working in a carnival and a quick glance at a memory book. This isn’t that kind of film. This is a celebration of the man and his music and must be seen on that level. If you can do that, this film will reward you with some great performances and amazing music.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Picture: Fred Berger, James Mangold, and Alex Heineman
Best Director: James Mangold
Best Actor: Timothée Chalamet
Best Supporting Actor: Edward Norton
Best Supporting Actress: Monica Barbaro
Best Adapted Screenplay: James Mangold and Jay Cocks
Best Sound: Tod A. Maitland, Donald Sylvester, Ted Caplan, Paul Massey, and David Giammarco
Best Costume Design: Arianne Phillips
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Release Date: December 25, 2024
Running Time: 140 Minutes
Rated R
Starring: Timothée Chalamet, Edward Norton, Elle Fanning, Monica Barbaro, Boyd Holbrook, and Scoot McNairy
Directed By: James Mangold
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