Bob Dylan (Timothee Chalamet) arrived in New York City in 1961 as a hitchhiking teenager from Minnesota with no money, connections or contacts. He was quickly embraced by Woody Guthrie (Scoot McNairy), Pete Seeger (Edward Norton), Joan Baez (Monica Barbaro) and others and became folk music's biggest star, crafting his own legacy as the ultimate mythmaker. The film follows Dylan, then in his early 20s, from 1961-65, culminating in his seminal, defiant and Joyful performance at the Newport Folk Festival--the moment that cemented his legacy as a songwriter and musician who changed culture and led him to become the global icon he is today.
Others to round out the cast are Elle Fanning as Sylvie Russo, Joe Tippett as Dave Van Ronk, Eriko Hatsune as Toshi Seeger, Pete's wife, Dan Folger as Albert Grossman and Riley Hashimoto as Danny Seeger.
This was directed with such fine dissection by the seasoned James Mangold ("Heavy" '95, "Cop Land" '97, "Girl, Interrupted" '99, "Kate & Leopold" '01, "Identity" '03, "Walk the Line" '05, "3:10 to Yuma" '07, "Knight & Day" '10, "The Wolverine" '13, "Logan" '17, "Ford v Ferrari" '19, "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny" '23) plus TV. This filmmaker's ability to sequence his film made observing it effortless. This was a film where his actors were able to go into that place to convince us that they were the personas we were watching. If you like his brand of directing, his "Star Wars: Dawn of the Jedi" is in pre production. It was equally well penned by writers James Mangold ("Oliver & Company" (animation screenplay) '88, "Heavy" '95, "Cop Land" '97, "Girl, Interrupted" '99, "Kate & Leopold" '01, "Walk the Line" '05, "Logan" '17, "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny" '23) plus TV and Jay Cocks ("Made in Milan" '90, "The Age of Innocence" '93, "Strange Days" '95, "Gangs of New York" '02, "De-Lovely" '04, "Silence" '16) plus TV, based on the book, "Dylan Goes Electric" by Elijah Wald. It assuredly was a stroke of genius to devote this story with the first four years of the beginning of Dylan's career so as to help keep the screenplay tighter to create more depth about this part of his life. Other than a couple of very small places of slowness in the script (about 5 minutes could've been cut), this was a spot on story. The dialect Chalamet acquired was amazing, but then again Tim Monich was his dialect coach who has trained the best of actors. And the fact that Chalamet sung all of the songs with a convincing dialect was brilliant acting. In fact, come Oscar time, I see both Chalamet copping a best actor nod as well as Norton receiving a supporting acting nod. We'll see.
As biopics go, this was certainly one of the best, and considering it only covered four years of Dylan's life tells me that he has led an interesting life to say the least. This was a captivating film with great acting, directing and music and gives us an appealing look at Dylan--the man behind the music.
Out of 4 Stars: 3.5 Rated: R 141mins.
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