ONCE UPON A TIME IN YOUR PRIME

I was pleasantly surprised by the new Dylan film A Complete Unknown, starring Timothy Chalamet, although I don't think my favourite rock 'n' roll biopic, La Bamba (1987), has too much to worry about in terms of being knocked from the top spot.

Of course, watching A Complete Unknown with one of my oldest friends—literally the planet's most devoted Dylan fan—forced me to put aside any curmudgeonly cynicism even before the film started. It was his night, not mine, and besides, I was genuinely intrigued to see how the director and screenwriter of the project would attempt to dramatize the story of the famously elusive and enigmatic poet-singer-songwriter, that vagabond oracle of his generation.

The first thing that struck me was the warm atmosphere director James Mangold and his team achieved in recreating a portrait of Greenwich Village in the early '60s—what might be called the "Freewheelin'" album cover filter that Cameron Crowe replicated so effectively in his Vanilla Sky (2001) movie with Tom Cruise. It was the opposite look to the steely grays and blues of the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis, which deliberately unromanticised and unsentimentalises that same time, just before Dylan arrived to knock the folk scene for a loop.

I kind of assumed that Timothy Chalamet would turn up in presenting his portrait of Dylan, but I didn't expect Edward Norton to deliver such a clingy performance as Pete Seeger or Monica Barbaro to bring such a fiery turn as Joan Baez. Both characters either side of Dylan seemed to represent the cult of folk that he wanted to extricate himself from in order to become a fully formed rocker. Although the existential jeopardy of that dilemma for Dylan felt a bit contrived and over the top by the end, it generally worked throughout, as the artist appeared to realise that, much like America itself, he would have to reinvent himself and his image time and time again. Like a rolling stone, he clearly seeks to gather no moss.

Rewatching the iconic Dylan documentary Don't Look Back (1967) after A Complete Unknown, I was struck by just how obnoxious Dylan could be at times, yet also how down-to-earth. He seemed strangely free from the burden of fame while simultaneously displaying moments of being a pretentious prima donna. To their credit, Mangold and Chalamet don’t attempt to over romanticise Dylan through artificial characterisation but instead lean into his elusive (sometimes awkward) vibe as the central mood of the film. The story explores how a young artist negotiates his fame by being "Rock 'n' Roll's Zelig," where the performative and ever-changing aspects of his image are all part of his ongoing evolution and although the timeline here is kept relatively narrow, I appreciated it for not trying to compress too much biography in one feature length movie.

On a more personal note, I couldn't help but remember how an ex-girlfriend of mine used to always sing Baez's "Diamonds and Rust" (the artist's famous song about her relationship with Dylan) and how she possessed similar characteristics to the female singer-songwriter. I was no Dylan, of course, but while she sang that haunting song around me, I felt a sense of connection to the intense nature of their unique relationship and, perhaps, should have seen it as a prophecy of our own ill-fated romance.

I'm reminded of that Dylan Thomas quote—that great hero of Bob's: "Why do men think you can pick love up and re-light it like a candle? Women know when love is over."