Chalamet Shines as Bob Dylan

James Mangold's A Complete Unknown covers 1961 to 1965, a period in which Bob Dylan, aka Robert Zimmerman, arrived in New York, shot to fame as a folk singer-songwriter, then shocked fans by plugging in an electric guitar at the Newport Folk Festival. Adapted from Elijah Wald's 2015 book Dylan Goes Electric!, the film starring Timothée Chalamet as Dylan has a 78% rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes. Here's what they're saying:

• The film is "brisk, tuneful and very entertaining," and Chalamet is "excellent" as he conveys the "presence" and unique voice of Dylan, writes Ty Burr at the Washington Post, giving the film three stars out of four. But "it's Edward Norton as Pete Seeger who really steals the show," he notes. "So perfectly does he capture Pete's generosity, piousness and near-total incomprehension at what's happening."
• Chalamet "delivers a startling impersonation of Dylan's singing and speaking voice." "Yet, because the movie emphasizes the characters' public faces even in private, it doesn't demand (and would hardly allow) true emotional depth and expressive range," writes Richard Brody at the New Yorker. It "simplifies Bob Dylan's early professional life and dilutes its furies" and "what's lost is the way a colossal spirit such as Dylan confronts everyday challenges with a heightened sense of style and daring."

• Caryn James argues Mangold "is too smart to attempt to explain Dylan, so the film sees him from the outside in, through others' eyes." Chalamet "is brilliant here and completely believable." But he's "better than the film itself"—"a likeable but disappointingly conventional film galvanized by its kinetic performances and irresistible music, and flattened by its safe, unimaginative script," James writes at the BBC. Ultimately, it can "feel by-the-numbers and perfunctory," equal to three stars out of five.
• "There are points to quibble" with the accuracy of the story, but "Monica Barbaro is a revelation" as Joan Baez, Dylan's on-again-off-again girlfriend, "Elle Fanning is captivating" as Sylvie Russo, a character based on Dylan's ex Suze Rotolo, and the film itself "is utterly fascinating," writes the AP's Mark Kennedy. It succeeds in "capturing a moment in time when songs had weight, when they could move the culture—even if the singer who made them was as puzzling as a rolling stone."

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