A Complete Unknown reviews praise Timothée Chalamet's 'hypnotic' role as Bob Dylan

A Complete Unknown is James Mangold's big return to the music biopic after his acclaimed Johnny Cash drama Walk The Line, and his take on Bob Dylan's rise to fame also proved a hit with critics.

The Timothée Chalamet-led production follows the folk artist from his early rise to fame in New York City's Greenwich Village scene, and his famous change to electric guitar. It tries to capture the musician's genius alongside the reality of a deeply private man grappling with fame.

As a movie the film was commended for its approach to the iconic musician, with Chalamet's portrayal proving to be the best part of it because of how "hypnotic" and "extraordinary" he is in the role.

The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw gave the film five stars and wrote that the Dune star delivers a "hilarious and seductive portrayal" of the singer. He wrote: "Chalamet is a hypnotic Dylan, performing the tracks himself and fabricating to a really impressive degree that stoner-hungover birdsong."

Bradshaw remarks on how Mangold redefined the music biopic as a genre with his 2005 Johnny Cash film, adding that A Complete Unknown "does not conform to the classic rise-fall-learning-experience-comeback format. It’s all rise, but troubled and unclear."

For The Hollywood Reporter's David Rooney the movie had its strengths and weaknesses, however Chalamet was the undoubted highlight. The critic wrote that the Call Me By Your Name star is "pouring himself into Dylan's songs", adding: "His voice — raw, nasal, scratchy but full of passion, anger and wry wisdom — is near enough to the original to be unmistakable and yet coloured by the actor’s persona to a degree that suggests something closer to symbiosis than impersonation."

Rooney goes on: "It’s a transformative performance, arguably Chalamet’s best since Call Me by Your Name" and argues that it helps to "propel [the movie] forward" despite some flaws with the script.

Variety's Owen Gleiberman describes the film as "a drama of scruffy naturalism", writing that the "plot that doesn’t so much unfold as lope right along with its legendary, curly-haired, sunglass-wearing coffee-house troubadour hero."

Comparing it to a musical rather than a standard music biopic, the critic adds that the movie is "tethered to Chalamet’s haunting performance — now hooded, now open, now despairing, now powered by rebel vibes".

This was something that Rolling Stone's Will Richards commended too, writing "Chalamet’s commitment to training his voice and learning the guitar so intently takes his performance beyond impersonation and towards something far more unique."

Sharing a similar sentiment The Standard's Nick Curtis wrote that Chalamet delivers "an extraordinary performance" that is "far deeper than an impersonation".

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The critic adds: "It's a defiantly unlikeable performance, miles away from Chalamet’s romantic leads. He captures Dylan’s craning stance and the way he used hair and sunglasses as a mask, the insistent buzz and keen of his speaking and singing voice and the odd, touchy, insularity."

IndieWire's David Ehlrich was one of the few critics not fully convinced by the biopic, writing that the film is "admirable yet deeply frustrating" because it "presents one of the most forcefully idiosyncratic figures of our lifetimes as a creature so inextricable from the culture he shaped that it all but deprives him of any agency of his own, a feeling exemplified by the film’s unwillingness to engage with its political context."

Ehlrich also referenced 2007 Dylan movie I'm Not There as he said of the lead actor: "It’s the only Chalamet performance that could lead someone to think 'Cate Blanchett did it better,' but Mangold invites the actor to unburden himself from imitation, and the actor takes him up on that offer.

"Matching the singer’s reedy mumble as best he can while still clinging to some palpable vestige of his own star persona, Chalamet communes with Dylan’s spirit so effectively that — paradoxical as this might sound — his embodiment can’t help but expose the futility of trying to do so."

A Complete Unknown premieres in cinemas on 17 January, 2025.