Did it take Timothée Chalamet to finally make me a Bob Dylan fan?

As I sit here writing, I’m listening to my copy of the double-vinyl Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits Vol. 2. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’ve never much enjoyed Dylan’s music, and I don’t think I’m going as far as saying the new movie A Complete Unknown has completely reset my Dylan compass.

But I saw the film last night and thought it was a masterpiece. It definitely opened my eyes to the fact that there may have never been a cooler young American than Bob Dylan back in 1965 when he was transitioning out of folk and into something a little more mixed in terms of genre.

And Timothée Chalamet may have been the only current young American who could have pulled off such a brilliant performance in the film—which has actually been out since Christmas Day.

Part of Chalamet’s greatness may have come from getting four years—instead of the expected four months—tor prepare for the role. The pandemic pushed everything back, giving him the opportunity to go from someone who didn’t even play guitar to someone who very convincingly does so and has a compelling Dylan voice and understated overall vibe to match.

I hope the Academy Awards go to Chalamet and Director James Mangold, who also directed the excellent 2005 Johnny Cash movie Walk the Line. In this one, it was a great decision to not try to definitely define the shape shifting Dylan. The movie at least partly works because it only focuses on the years 1961—when he meets his idol Woody Guthrie—through just after the 1965 Newport Folk Festival and the release of his classic album Highway 61 Revisited.

Another of the elements that keeps the film so riveting is the love triangle of sorts that includes Dylan and Elle Fanning as his girlfriend “Sylvie Russo” and the sultry folk star Joan Baez, played by Monica Barbaro.

Edward Norton as Pete Seeger is a casting choice that also works really well, and I think it’s likely an improvement over the originally cast Benedict Cumberbatch. Norton too learned to play the banjo from scratch in about two months.

There are some rock legends I tend to learn a lot about, like The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and many others. That has never been the case with Dylan. I’m actually still somewhat obliviously uneducated about his story and deep catalog. Which is all pretty weird because I’m such of scholar of the Beats, and Dylan flows so effortlessly from that scene. It’s even cooler that he didn’t want to be stereotyped into that scene—which is basically the focus of the movie.

I’ve always appreciated folk, but I really laughed at how much more I identified with the faces in the Newport Folk Festival audience who were so excited that he was blasting rock n’ roll into their faces. I may finally be ready to join them in what was surely their starting point on a deep dive of Dylan.

5 out of 5 stars