3.5/5 stars
“You’re kind of an a**hole, Bob,” singer Joan Baez says in James Mangold’s Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown.
That Dylan does indeed come across as “kind of an a**hole” is not to say the film does not worship the ground the singer-songwriter walks on. Beginning in 1961, this adaptation of Elijah Wald’s book Dylan Goes Electric! covers just a few short years in the life of the folk-singing troubadour.
The film steers audiences to the singer’s famed appearance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, when he got up on stage and played his music on an electric guitar, much to the chagrin of the concertgoers.
Playing Dylan is Timothée Chalamet, who gives one of the best performances of his career. Hidden behind Dylan’s trademark shades, Chalamet is entirely at ease as the surly singer who increasingly finds fame an alienating experience. “They wanna own me,” he mumbles.
When the film opens, he has arrived in New York from Minnesota, already fully formed as an artist. Barely 20, his profound lyrics seem to touch everyone who hears them.
