James Mangold - 'A Complete Unknown' movie review
A look at James Mangolds's Bob Dylan biopic 'A Complete Unknown', starring Timothée Chalamet, which has left us wanting to listen to albums and not watch movies.
(Credits: Far Out / Searchlight Pictures)
Film » New Reviews
Thu 16 January 2025 17:07, UK
It’s one of the most talked about movies in recent memory: the Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown, has landed, and the notion is not without its detractors. We have been inundated with biopics and backstories in recent years. Entertainment icons are unceremoniously stripped of their mystery and have their lives caked in mediocrity by the next director who insists on ‘shining a light’ on their true colours. But often enough, the subjects turn out to be not very interesting, and the mythology behind their status and their work is what grounded them in intrigue, with their personal lives sometimes feeling like pointless detours when seeing their relationships and struggles splattered across the big screen.
This isn’t to say that all biopics follow this formula. Still, with the rising trend of studios adapting the life of every possible public figure into cinema-ready ticket sellers instead of coming up with new stories, we’ve seen the lives of countless random celebrities on the silver screen who are very much alive and well — a phenomenon that I find almost too bizarre to comprehend. Because of this, I felt apprehensive about James Mangold’s Dylan biopic.
When describing the inspiration behind sharing this story, Mangold, who also took charge of one of the more successful biopics, the Johnny Cash story Walk The Line, expressed that he was less interested in an overview of Dylan’s entire life but in creating a snapshot of one specific period, following the singer being completely unknown into global stardom, from 1961-1965. A scruffy and dishevelled-looking Timothée Chalamet is seen aloofly wandering around the city, paying an impromptu visit to Woody Guthrie on his quest to find inspiration. From here, we see the beginnings of a formula that litters the rest of the film, with continuous close-ups that cut between Dylan playing a song to the bewildered eyes of the person he is performing to, so subtly informing us that maybe this kid is going to be a star.
From this point onwards, the film is defined by three repeated scenes during Dylan’s rise to fame. The first is the musical icon performing to a crowd of mesmerised onlookers with a focus on Pete Seeger as the realisation of the talent he has discovered washes over him. The second is Dylan oscillating between Joan Baez and Sylvie Russo (Suze Rotolo) as he accepts their love before being distracted by his guitar. The other is the most obvious clip which frames Dylan with sunglasses most firmly on, as he is showered with praise that he, being just a touch too cool, naturally hates.
While not unenjoyable, the formulaic structure of the picture begins to feel extremely uninspired and pointless, with Mangold relying on Chalamet’s impressive performance and constant concert scenes to create a semblance of a plot. But more than anything, any biopic hinges on the character at the heart of the story, and in the case of A Complete Unknown raises an interesting point about the stories that we deem worthy to share. Despite being undeniably talented, Dylan is a notoriously reserved character and, judging by this production, sadly had a personality about as dry as sandpaper.
Timothée Chalamet in A Complete Unknown (Credits: Searchlight Pictures)As well as this, there is the classically infuriating trope of the ‘moody’ male artist who treats the women in his life like disposable objects, with the figures of Baez and Russo (Rotolo) being used as a backdrop to his scruffy genius bit, despite appearing infinitely more fascinating. It’s difficult to understand the appeal, with Dylan mumbling barely intelligible sentences and scurrying off to his guitar after every hookup, ignoring their presence as he hurriedly scratches away at his notebook while workshopping the beginnings of ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’. Mangold is painfully obvious in his implications, with the women being relegated to nagging wives while their mysterious partner squeezes out another stroke of genius as if to justify this infuriating behaviour.
The whole wounded/tortured artist act is only interesting if there is a genuine story to justify it. In Dylan’s case, this persona is rooted in nothing other than the fact that he was a bit of an arsehole as well as a songwriting genius, and sadly, the most interesting thing about him is his music, which isn’t a strong enough foundation for a biopic when another medium for indulging in his art already exists.
There are flashes of interesting ideas about creative integrity and the corruption of fame, with small insights into a larger conversation about the psychological damage of celebrity and the way it abuses our egos. However, Mangold does not delve into these ideas in any substantial way, with one or two scenes as Dylan refuses to play his hit songs in order to assert control over his image, ultimately not compelling enough to add a deeper weight to the story.
While there is nothing offensive about A Complete Unknown, this is perhaps its biggest crime. In my opinion, the worst thing a film can do is take no risks, and Mangold has played it ridiculously safe by using brilliant actors to lift up an otherwise pointless and average story about an artist who cared about nothing but his craft, with a sparse inner world and personal life that does not provide enough meat for a feature film. While he was certainly talented, perhaps we should stop assuming that the lives of artists utterly enveloped by their work will be just as interesting as the work they created.
Genius does not infer substance, and perhaps Hollywood should shift their focus to biopics on artists who showed a fragment of a personality than names big enough to bolster box office receipts.
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James MangoldTimothee Chalamet
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