A Complete Unknown

I loved A Complete Unknown. To me, it is a story of lost innocence-a modern fall from Eden. Dylan's relentless chase for what he thinks will make him happy only highlights his longing for what he has already lost. The problem is, he doesn't know who he is. His evolving relationships mirror the changes in his music, and by the end, he seems to realize that whatever he's become, he regrets some of his choices because there's no going back.

And the soundtrack? Absolutely killer-every track perfectly captures Dylan's transformation and inner conflict, making the film an unforgettable theater experience.

There was one weakness in this film that made inferior to Inside Llewyn Davis; it lacked authenticity. How odd that a completely fictional character like Llewyn Davis had the feel of the real Bob Dylan, and the Bob Dylan film did not.

I lived through this era personally. I loved this music as it started, and evolved from 1961 to the present day. I remember strolling through the Village feeling more alive than at any other time of my life. I went to the early shows of Bob Dylan, and thought he was a genius.

This film, however, does not match Inside Llewyn Davis for catching that sense of genius. It is very slick, and well done, but just not as authentic.

The writer-director, James Mangold, does a magnificent job of capturing the atmosphere of the 1960s with great authenticity. His inclusion of the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Kennedy Assassination mirror the anxiety of the times.

The lead actor, TImothee Chalamet, does an outstanding job as Dylan. He is amply supported by a powerhouse cast led by Edward Norton.

The story about Dylan's arrival in the Village in the early 60s was done well.

The cinematography and set designs are letter-perfect; but something was missing. Believability.

Even if you've heard the songs ten-thousand times, one of the many remarkable things about "A Complete Unknown" is remembering - or reliving - the sensation of hearing them for the first time.

People who tear up just watching the trailer for this Bob Dylan biopic will know what I'm talking about.

People who don't - including a couple of generations who weren't around yet - have a lot to learn from writer-director James Mangold's magnificent retelling of Dylan's early years. They span his 1961 arrival in Greenwich Village and pilgrimage to the bedside of dying Woody Guthrie, to the Newport Folk Festival where he upended the folk music world he had championed by going electric in 1965.

The movie features incredible Golden Globe-nominated performances - more like feats of channeling - by Timothée Chalamet as Dylan and Edward Norton as Pete Seeger, along with Monica Barbaro doing a wonderful Joan Baez and Elle Fanning as long-suffering girlfriend Sylvia Russo.

But the film's real "star" is the music, rather than the prickly personality of this honky tonk American demigod destined to win a Nobel Prize in Literature in 2016, and to still be performing on his endless tour well into his 80s.

With all the stars doing their own singing, "A Complete Unknown" is a chills-up-the-spine musical treasure chest, overflowing with dozens of the greatest songs ever written. Viewers of my generation will thrill witnessing the moment of creation of songs that changed history, over and over. Not only are the songs born anew, but still images - album cover photos in particular, stared at for years - come to life before our eyes.

Backgrounds, too - Greenwich Village, Manhattan apartments, recording studios and penthouses; outdoor folk festivals from Newport to Monterey - shine, seemingly in the light generated by the idealism of that brief American moment. Filmmaker Mangold's beautiful film pulses with energy amid all the impeccably observed period details.

Burning with ambition when he arrived in New York, 19-year-old Bobby Dylan had a new name and fanciful stories of traveling with carney shows instead of true accounts of his upbringing as Robert Zimmerman in Hibbing, Minnesota. A slave of his music, he was hardly ready when the fame he had sought descended on him overnight.

His genius and intuition were once-in-a-generation gifts. His psyche and temperament were made of flimsier stuff ... even though he was almost as good at wisecracking as he was at writing songs.

"You know, you're kind of an asshole," Joan Baez tells him shortly after they get together.

That doesn't stop them from making beautiful music together, amidst all the other exhilarating performances on screen.

The tension between Dylan's almighty gift and his his very human difficulties handling it make "A Complete Unknown" unlike other music biopics. Fans know lots of the details already. Every time Bob climbs on his Triumph, we know where he's heading.

Time has always been Dylan's "thing." He's a physicist as much as a poet in understanding the nature of change. The songs he wrote in the film's time frame were astounding for summing up everything, from romantic love to geopolitics, in words everyone knew were true the first time we heard them. It was Dylan, rather than our teachers in school, who educated us.

Sixty years later, at the other end of the timeline, his lyrics are just as just as immediate, just as profound, just as funny.

Bob Dylan was, and is, the voice of our culture in our time.

There's no way this movie can't be an homage and tribute, but it doesn't glorify.

Instead, it's more honest ... more interesting ... more ambiguous ... For all the books, PhD dissertations and decades of efforts to know the man behind the voice, Bob Dylan remains as elusive and enigmatic as ever. There's no "answer" to what, or who, he is.

He just is.

"A Complete Unknown" is just a new way of connecting some of the dots, resulting in a wonderfully alive film experience, a musical thrill show, a return to our youth.

When it opens in theaters Christmas Day, I imagine I won't have been the only one sitting through the final credits just to hear the songs one more time.

I was more impressed by the film's technical aspects than its narrative. Mangold has returned to the vibrant color palette he employed in Identity (2003), departing from the muted tones of films like 3:10 to Yuma (2007) and Logan (2017).

The visuals, captured with Sony Venice cameras at an ISO of 12800, create a stunning New York composition.

Those who, like me, have seen Todd Haynes' I'm Not There (2007) won't be claiming that Timothée Chalamet "became Bob Dylan," despite his undeniably strong performance.

However, Monica Barbaro truly embodies Joan Baez.

Certain shots in the film so closely resemble Bob Dylan's photographic archive that I found myself exclaiming "I've seen this photo!" over thirty times throughout the viewing. It's as if there was no script, and an AI was simply tasked with creating a film using chronologically arranged Bob Dylan photographs. Bob Dylan collectors like myself might particularly enjoy seeing the photographs from the album sleeves come to life.

Yes, this is an excellent biopic, but that's largely due to the dearth of well-made biographical films that aren't filled with decontextualized anecdotes.

And yes, this is a superb New York film. The technical achievements I mentioned earlier contribute to a magnificent depiction of the era's New York. I suspect the film's Oscar prospects might lie in these categories.

Incidentally, while Chalamet claims to have performed many of the songs himself, there's a clear technical enhancement in the vocal delivery.

The truth is, the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), despite its understated narrative, captures the era, the people, and the New York depicted in this film far more effectively, and in monochrome. I hadn't realized how deeply Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) had resonated with me until I saw this film.

I was expecting a lot from this film and in some cases it delivered. The acting is great across the board with Chalamet portraying Dylan brilliantly and his singing is really on point.

The problem with the film is that the story reads like a greatest hits rather than a biopic. It's like the writers and director wanted to fit as many songs in as possible and forgot they were meant to be telling a story at the same time.

It's not a bad film in any way, I just was expecting it to be better than average. With the quality of acting and singing in the film it really deserved better story telling to go with it.