The Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown features a heartfelt central performance from Timothée Chalamet, whose portrayal of Dylan’s early years has rightly garnered widespread acclaim. The performance is up for an Academy Award in March, and he’s considered an outside bet to win his first Oscar. Yet Chalamet’s turn as the young musician during his first electric period may well have been bested already, 17 years ago, by the unlikeliest of actors.
Given the controversy around Adrien Brody’s Best Actor nomination for the 2025 Oscars, Chalamet now has every chance of winning. If he does, though, he might want to mention Cate Blanchett in his acceptance speech. Blanchett’s depiction of Bob Dylan in the 2007 experimental film I’m Not There came straight out of left field, but leaves an indelible legacy that few other portrayals of the singer, including Chalamet’s, could ever live up to.
Cate Blanchett’s Portrayal Of Dylan In I’m Not There Is Uncanny
She Captures The Spirit Of His Electric-Era Persona
Never mind that Blanchett was a cisgender Australian woman in her late thirties playing an American man in his early twenties, it feels like she was born to play this version of Bob Dylan circa 1965. For fans of Dylan in particular, it’s worth watching the movie I’m Not There before A Complete Unknown just to compare Blanchett’s and Chalamet’s respective takes on one of modern music’s most significant icons. Both films depict the same key moments in this part of Dylan’s career, including his infamous electric set at a folk festival and his tense encounter with journalists at a press conference.
But unfortunately for Chalamet, there can only be one winner in this comparison. Blanchett’s Dylan is sublimely accurate, not so much in terms of surface-level mannerisms, but her overall manner of speaking and acting. She perfectly embodies the contrarian spirit and spiky demeanor of her character, casting Dylan’s languid shadow over New York’s underground music scene. Just as the man himself did, she spits reporters’ questions right back at them, with responses like, “How can I answer that if you’ve got the nerve to ask me?” No other actor has captured Bob Dylan’s 1960s zenith as a countercultural symbol quite so effectively.
Chalamet Does A Great Impression Whereas Blanchett Gives A Brilliant Performance
Blanchett’s Dylan Feels More Like The Real Thing
On the other hand, Timothée Chalamet often looks and sounds exactly like a young Dylan in A Complete Unknown. His portrayal expertly studied, from the way he fiddles nervously with his harmonica to the distinctive intonations in his speaking voice. But practice doesn’t always make perfect. Chalamet might appear to be “doing” a better Dylan, but Blanchett digs deep into the well of the character’s emotional complexity and brings out his spirit.
A Complete Unknown’s co-writer and director James Mangold has ensured that every last detail of the movie captures Dylan’s life and career as it was – or appeared to be – including Chalamet’s singing and musicianship. It’s no wonder the project got the seal of approval from its subject, who was nowhere near as involved in the making of I’m Not There.
Chalamet, for his part, does a very good impression of Dylan singing at Newport Folk Festival in A Complete Unknown, whereas Blanchett’s version of ‘Maggie’s Farm’ doesn’t sound quite as like the original. Yet her performance feels more like what Dylan was going for than Chalamet’s precise mimicry does.
Blanchett As Dylan Is An Example Of Her Extraordinary Acting Range
She’s Embodied A Wide Array Of Real And Fictional Characters Through The Years
As far-fetched as Cate Blanchett playing Bob Dylan sounds until you see it, it should come as no surprise that she’s capable of such a miraculous transformation. She’s spent her entire career as an actor reaching for improbable characterizations of both fictional and real-world figures, achieving virtually all of them with distinction, thanks to the incredible range she’s developed. Blanchett’s best movie roles include two different portrayals of Queen Elizabeth I, a scene-stealing outing as Hollywood great Katharine Hepburn in The Aviator, and a dazzling example of physical acting as Berlin orchestra conductor Lydia Tár.
Blanchett’s portrayal of Bob Dylan will likely never get the full credit it deserves.
Still, Blanchett’s portrayal of Bob Dylan will likely never get the full credit it deserves. Timothée Chalamet might have to accept it on her behalf, if A Complete Unknown does win out at the Oscars. Of course, the real winner here is Dylan himself, who’s now been the subject of two award-worthy portrayals across different generations, each one of them bringing new attention to his incomparable body of work as a тιтan of modern music.
