First, an interesting coincidence, I was walking from my car to the movie theater when the news of former president Jimmy Carter's passing appeared on my phone. The first song in A Complete Unknown was "Song To Woody", the opening, I remember, was the passage used at the start of Jimmy Carter's autobiography, written decades ago.
To write a movie about Bob Dylan, I would think, is an amazing undertaking. His personality and life are so enigmatic.
Timothee Chalomet, plays a thoroughly convincing Bob Dylan right down to looks and sounds. Monica Barbaro's voice captures the beauty of Joan Baez, an amazing irony, since she is not even a singer. From what I've read, both actors did their own singing.
The movie starts with Dylan's arrival in New York, at the time, the folk music scene is very open and welcoming. Dylan, a stranger at the time, drops in on the hospital bed of his idol Woody Guthrie. Also present is Guthrie's friend, folk music legend Pete Seeger. Both impressed with his singing, Seeger takes Dylan in.
The movie definitely reflects the time (early to mid 1960s) as character continually smoke cigarettes anywhere and anytime. Something you don't see today. The events of the period were reflected in tapes of broadcasts from Walter Cronkite and such on Dylan's tiny Black and White TV.
Dylan is portrayed as a very complicated loner. Seeking fame, but not comfortable with it, once it's achieved.
As it happens, although Folk is basically a music that calls for change, the genre itself was very resistant to it.
Bob wanted to take his fame to the next level, by introducing changes that basically put his career on the line. Changes that even nearly alienated him from longtime friend and advocate Seeger.
Because of Dylan's risks (seen by some at the time as maybe as sell-out) the lines between folk and pop were lessened, perhaps paving the way for artists like James Taylor, Jackson Browne, Carly Simon, and the later day Carole King.
I would wholeheartedly recommend A Complete Unknown.
