• by Barbara Lippert , Columnist, January 2, 2025

Released on the night before Christmas, “A Complete Unknown” is a biopic about that much-worshipped Boomer messiah, Bob Dylan.

The film has gotten mostly favorable reviews so far, many qualified along the lines of “I was pleasantly surprised.”

Except for the critic at the Boston Globe, who called the film “A Complete Sell-Out.”  He argues that “Unknown” is a project created merely as Oscar bait.

I hadn’t heard the phrase “sellout” in a while, but it goes two ways. The James Mangold-directed movie covers the times that were a’changin’ from 1961, Dylan’s arrival in Greenwich Village, and his meteoric rise in the next four years until his historic performance in 1965.

That’s because it’s based on the book, “Dylan Goes Electric!” subtitled “Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night That Split the Sixties.”

The movie ends with Bob being booed at Newport for switching to a Fender guitar and the backing of a blasting rock-n-roll band at an otherwise soft-strumming folkie festival.

The phrase “sellout” was not thrown at Dylan at the time.  Rather, someone yelled “Judas!”

As for using the term “sellout” as a way of saying non-pure, or too commercial, I think that point became moot at least 60 years ago.

But the other interpretation is more literal, in that “A Complete Unknown” (a completely forgettable title) is packing theater seats wherever it’s been playing.

I saw it at a sold-out show, and couldn’t believe how spectacular actor Timothee Chalamet was.

The screenplay itself lacks depth and range, but Chalamet nails Dylan’s elemental dynamism, and it’s a pleasure to hear him perform the songs and see him transform himself into the rising bard. (Ed Norton is also note-perfect as folk singer Pete Seeger.)

Chalamet resembles the young Bob uncannily, with the same (as a friend called it) “Bar Mitzvah face” that belies the simultaneous womanizing.

The Joan Baez character calls him an “asshole,” with good reason, and there’s also been some controversy about how the women in the film are portrayed.

And yet, just sitting in a darkened theater, listening to Dylan’s greatest hits from that period, becomes an (almost) religious experience. See it.

But speaking of sellout, I couldn’t help but remember one of Dylan’s most profoundly perverse, true sellout moments.

Until 2004, while his music had been licensed for use in a variety of spots, he had never appeared in one -- until Bob emerged on screen lurking around a Venetian palazzo, wearing a black cowboy hat and a pencil-thin moustache, a classic bad guy with massively pervy overtones.

Yes, I speak of that shocking Victoria’s Secret commercial.

Call me crazy, but I’m not sure the setup would send teen girls streaming into stores.

Remember that in 2016, he would choose not to appear in person to accept his Nobel Prize in literature in Stockholm. But 12 years prior, in his mid-60s, he agreed to go to Italy to promote  push-up bras and panties, where no man had ever trod before.

His co-star was 20-something supermodel Adriana Lima, clad in the brand’s signature feathered wings and skimpy undies.

It was directed by Adrian Lyne, known for overtly erotic movies like “9 1/2 Weeks.” At that point Victoria's Secret marketed itself through stereotypical male fantasies, but the creatives at least knew enough not to show Dylan in the same room with Lima at the same time.

The video is titled “Angels in Venice.”  But Bob looks more like death than sex.

Dylan’s 1997  “Love Sick” is used as the musical track, one of his more despondent tunes.

Nothing erotic is spelled out in the spot, but still, there is a hint of hanky panky. Lima mostly struts around in her high heels and wings. The line “I see silhouettes in the window,” matches a close-up of Lima’s cleavage.  Later, Mr. Mystery is shown dramatically throwing his cowboy hat onto the floor. And just like that, cut to Lima, wearing the hat.

The ending lines up with the lyrics “I’m sick of love; I wish I’d never met you,” a very Bob phrase, but certainly a mixed message for selling sexy underthings.

Oddly enough, the musical legend himself foreshadowed such an event. At a press conference in England in the 1960s, Dylan was asked what product he’d sell out for. The journos in the room laughed when he quickly responded, “ladies’ undergarments.”

And still, the question is “Why, Bob?” Selling bras was a terrible decision, but he’s known for being contrary and pissing people off.

Perhaps he thought he’d reach a more youthful audience for his music.

But that was not to happen until the release of “A Complete Unknown,” with Timothee Chalamet, 29, doing a press tour, and attracting millennials, Gen Y and Z alike to the inherent mystery of Bobby D’s music.