A Complete Unknown

Chalamet remains a highlight of the film. He bears an impressive physical resemblance to early 60s Dylan, and he’s nailed the slightly nasal gruffness of the singing voice.

It’s captivating, even if you could argue that it’s dramatically underpowered. The events building up to Newport are listless in nature, but it has a seductive, meditative, cumulative power. I wasn’t bored for a single second.

If you can endure Elle Fanning as Sylvie Russo (a version of the late Suze Rotolo) watching Dylan sing It Ain’t Me Babe with Baez and weepily realise that, yes, it ain’t Sylvie, babe, then you can also endure the rest of the Walk Hard clunkiness.

Edward Norton is astonishing as Seeger, who gave Dylan a lot of early breaks and is painted as something of a father figure. He is the only actor whose soul you feel, in those kind but slightly wincey, paternal-but-rather-conflicted eyes.

On rewatch, some of the usual biopic sins are [still] there... but it was also clearer that the film is consciously constructed around a central question, which, in Dylan’s case, is ‘the’ central question.

A Complete Unknown offers solid renditions of iconic music, but it ultimately plays it too safe in its depiction of a daring artist.

Terrific! My favourite biopic since the double-whammy of Ray and Walk the Line in the middle-2000s. It’s formulaic... but beautifully crafted and structured by Mangold. Chalamet delivers a phenomenal performance!

Barbaro's performance as Baez is charismatic and moving, bringing an added dimension to Dylan's portrait. [Full review in Spanish]

Thanks to a bravura performance by Timothée Chalamet as the enigmatic Bard of Minnesota, it amounts to a compellingly plausible authorised account of Dylan’s early-Sixties breakthrough years.

A Complete Unknown may seem evasive at times, but as a portrait of why Bob Dylan still means so much to so many, it’s an accomplished success.