Questioning A Complete Unknown

When the teaser for the Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown, dropped, I said it would be my dad’s favorite movie of the year, because he loves folk music, and Pete Seeger is his favorite folk guy, and Joan Baez is one of his favorite folk gals, and the film features both (Edward Norton stars as Seeger, Monica Barbaro as Baez). Well, I showed him the teaser, and he…wasn’t into it. He said, “I’ve never heard anyone tell a good version of that story. Not even Pete.”

So, now that the full trailer is out, I sent it to him and asked for a second opinion. He said, “Joan looks good. He treated her awful.” When I asked about the “good version” of the story he said, “It’s just not an interesting story. Everything always worked out for Dylan.” Folk music is not my favorite, and unlike my dad, I wasn’t around for the folk revolution of the 1960s, but I did get a copy of Dylan Goes Electric!: Newport, Seeger, Dylan and the Night that Split the Sixties, the book the film is based on, because I am now SUPER interested in this and my dad is a terrible storyteller. I must know more to better set my expectations for the film, which…does not look fascinating.

Oh sure, Timmy-Bob looks and sounds plenty convincing as Bob Dylan, but when do we ever worry about Timothée Chalamet’s performances? We know he’ll deliver. Monica Barbaro also looks and sounds great as Joan Baez, and I do appreciate the film is apparently not shying away from Dylan treating the women in his life badly. And you KNOW I am ALL OVER Boyd Holbrook as Johnny Cash. But the hook is not gripping me. Because like my dad said, the hook is basically that Bob Dylan started playing electric guitar, and it all worked out. 

The hook for Elvis was Baz Luhrman + the King, a match made in tacky heaven. The hook for Walk the Line was the behind-the-scenes romance between Johnny Cash and June Carter, which upended their lives. The hook for A Complete Unknown appears to be “Bob Dylan was kind of a jerk and then everything was okay”. Maybe I’m just shook because I expected my dad to be into this and his indifference is so unexpected I no longer know what’s real. What am I missing? Besides Timmy-Bob, I mean. I understand the appeal of Timothée Chalamet and that people will see this just for him, just as Dylan fans will turn out because it’s about him. But for everyone else, what is the appeal here? 

Or maybe Timmy-Bob is enough. Maybe that’s all it takes. But I’ve always felt one reason Walk Hard is able to so accurately parody musician biopics, even 21 years later, is because so many musician biopics get made without real narrative purpose, they just copy-paste the same formulaic elements, ticking boxes as the film recreates a highlight reel of the subject’s life. I hope A Complete Unknown has more under the hood than just a highlight reel of Bob Dylan’s early days, but this trailer isn’t convincing me. Is it convincing you?