A Complete Unknown. (My Review)

American audiences have been able to view A Complete Unknown the new biographical film about Bob Dylan for three weeks now, and yesterday it was finally released in Britain. I went to see it last night at the Odeon in Trowbridge, so I thought I would give you my thoughts. The film begins in 1961 with Bob arriving in New York in search of his hero Woody Guthrie. It catches the bohemian atmosphere perfectly with such little details as when Bob reached Greenwich Village there is a poet ranting from a soapbox on a street corner which presumably  would be Allen Ginsberg. Bob tracks down Woody to Greystones Hospital where he also has a fortuitous encounter with Pete Seeger who introduces Bob into the New York folk music scene. I thought Edward Norton who played Pete Seeger was outstanding, especially when I found out that he sang and played the banjo himself. Shortly after his arrival Bob meets Sylvia Russo played by Elle Fanning. Now, I have read that Bob co-operated in the making of the film and approved of Timothee Chalamet playing him, but requested that the name of his real-life girlfriend of the time which was Suze Rotolo not to be used, hence we get Sylvia Russo. It seems a bit strange because all the other major characters keep their real names. 

Many of the famous faces from Greenwich Village are featured, such as Joan Baez, Dave Van Ronk, and Maria Muldaur. I was hoping that Karen Dalton would be mentioned, but she wasn’t, also Dylan knew the Clancy Brothers in Greenwich Village who were a big influence, but they didn’t appear. The mood of the times was captured vividly, with the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy’s assassination and the Civil Rights movement being portrayed. Dylan used all these dramatic events to his advantage by writing songs which tapped into the collective consciousness of the times, but he himself was apolitical. 

He also used Joan Baez as a stepping stone to fame and fortune, she was the girl on the half-shell, already famous when Bob arrived and gave her the little boy lost act. In all fairness she used him as well and got her hands on his songs. I thought Dan Fogler gave a fine performance as Bob’s manager Albert Grossman. Anyone who has seen the documentary Don’t Look Back will know what Albert was like in real life, shrewd and hard as nails, but quite comical. He gets one of the best lines in the film where Pete Seeger is almost pleading with Bob not to do an electric set at Newport. Albert says to Pete something like, “You wanna give them candles, but Bob’s selling lightbulbs”. 

Another performance I thought was very comical was Muddy Waters son Big Bill Morganfield as blues singer Jesse Moffette who meets Bob on Pete Seeger's TV show and they share a bottle of whiskey. I think Jesse is a fictitious character. I have never heard of him, but it was a very funny scene. Johnny Cash played by Boyd Holbrook also deserves a mention. Although Dylan approved of Timothee Chalamet’s performance Bob himself doesn’t come over as a very nice person in the film, often appearing to be supercilious and insulting to other people. The songs speak for themselves however, nobody in popular music has written words as poetic as Dylan. It can be hard to be humble sometimes when you know you’re the best. Also, you have to have sympathy with Dylan because when he had mined the folk scene for all it was worth he wanted to move on, experiment, and shake up rock music. The traditionalists like Joan Baez & Pete Seeger wanted him to serve up more of the same. He felt pressurised and irritated by this. 

I think Chalamet deserves an Oscar for his performance, not just for the acting, but also for the hard work he must have put in practicing the singing and guitar and harmonica playing. Monica Barbaro as Joan Baez was also excellent. I don’t think I learned anything new from seeing this film, except I didn’t know that Joe Boyd was the sound man at the Newport Folk Festival when Pete thought about putting an axe to the cables. Joe Boyd later moved to the UK and produced some of the greatest albums in British folk-rock. Speaking about Newport I was slightly irritated when someone in the audience shouted out, “Judas”, at Dylan, and Dylan replied, “I don’t believe you, you’re a liar, play it loud”. Any Dylan fan worth their salt knows that this happened at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester.

It would be churlish though to complain about little historical inaccuracies, because I thoroughly enjoyed this film portrait of one of the greatest figures of the last 100 years. I can’t stop wondering though if Bob Dylan really was the voice of a generation, how come people like Trump become President. It doesn’t make sense.