‘A Complete Unknown’ Review: A Thrilling Tour of Established Myth

The truth at the heart of James Mangold’s Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown, lies in its title. The line, taken from Dylan’s 1965 hit “Like a Rolling Stone,” hints at the eternal conundrum of any film about an artist: What can we really discover about them in two hours? Rather than tackling Dylan’s entire life story, a concern of many other music biopics, Mangold opts to hone in a particular period of the musician’s career, basing the movie largely on Elijah Wald’s 2015 book Dylan Goes Electric!. This centers the lens on a pivotal moment in Dylan’s musicianship, as well as a tumultuous historical era, without becoming bogged down in his past or his present—a decision that ultimately ensures that Dylan remains as mysterious as ever.

A young Dylan, played by an uncanny Timothée Chalamet, who immerses himself in the role in a way that is deeply pleasurable to observe, arrives in New York City in the back of a station wagon, as if magically appearing in a myth rather than from his home in Minnesota. The scene is set in 1961’s Greenwich Village, but Dylan almost immediately hops in a taxi to New Jersey, where he’s in search of his hero Woody Guthrie (Scoot McNairy). It’s in Woody’s hospital room that Robert Zimmerman encounters fellow folk singer Pete Seeger (an earnest Edward Norton) and plays them his tune “Song to Woody,” a moment that reassures the audience that Chalamet can both sing and strum the guitar in a resolutely Dylan-esque manner.

This encounter sets Dylan on a path to stardom that begins in Greenwich Village clubs and culminates at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. He meets Sylvie Russo (Elle Fanning), an fictional riff on Dylan’s real-life girlfriend Suze Rotolo, and Joan Baez (an impressive Monica Barbaro), who is far more famous than him at the time. He signs with a record label with the help of music manager Albert Grossman (Dan Fogler) and begins recording his self-titled debut, a 1962 album that featured “Song to Woody” as well as numerous traditional folk and blues numbers. Dylan, it’s emphasized, couldn’t yet be trusted with his originals, which we see him pensively typing in his small, artsy apartment and plucking out on his battered acoustic guitar. Chalamet gamely performs what feels like dozens of songs throughout the film, veering away from imitation and finding his own version of Dylan’s guttural growl.

Dylan’s musical trajectory is set against the political and social landscape of the early 1960s, which brought the Civil Rights movement and the Cuban Missile Crisis. During the latter, New York City comes to a standstill and Dylan wanders the empty streets, the following dawn yet uncertain, and it’s then that he and Joan begin a relationship that shifts from lustful to bitter as the years pass. Their collaborations are among the film’s most successful moments, thanks in part to Barbaro, who does a lot with an underwritten role. Fanning, too, infuses Sylvie with a sense of importance, even as Dylan eventually and inadvertently discards his formative girlfriend. It’s his association with Bob Neuwirth (Will Harrison) that’s played as almost more important, sending Dylan spiraling towards electric music—a choice that ultimately refocuses his career.

Chalamet, who studied movement, singer, harmonica and guitar to prepare to play Dylan, is an effective star. He has Dylan’s mannerisms down, almost instinctually, and each musical number, not all of which are included in the film in full, remind you of why Dylan is the legend that he is. His rendition of “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall,” from the singer’s second LP The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, is especially resonant, as is his showcase of “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue,” a song that remains the subject of speculation (it’s played in the film almost as a farewell to Dylan’s early work). By the time Dylan and his band go electric, an infamous moment in his lore, we understand him as someone we don’t really understand. He’s an erratic artist, influenced by those around him, first Guthrie and Seeger, then Johnny Cash (Boyd Holbrook). He hides behind a wild mop of hair and sunglasses, hunching over a guitar as if that’s the only place he can truly be himself. To Mangold, and perhaps even to Chalamet, Dylan is a mythical figure rather than a human.

Most biopics attempt to find the human behind that myth, searching through scarred childhoods and dysfunctional relationships for a sense of truth. “Who are they really?” the films ask. Mangold seems less concerned with that, for better or worse. A Complete Unknown never really parses anything new about Dylan or reveals his psychology, instead letting us continue to wonder about the man behind the dark lens. It’s a thrilling, entertaining journey as we do, with performances that never falter by actors who clearly did the work and then let it go once on set. You’ll dig out your old Dylan vinyl after watching it, a credit to how accurately the film depicts his songs. Don’t think twice, this one’s all right.