The Troubled Tune of Hollywood’s Music Biopics

Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan in 'A Complete Unknown' (2024).

As Jeremy Allen White takes the stage as Bruce Springsteen in Deliver Me From Nowhere, it’s easy to expect a big, flashy spectacle, something loud and dramatic. But there is a question that lingers in the background: can the modern music biopic still surprise us, or has it simply given in, step by step, to the predictable demands of awards season as the infamous ‘Oscar bait’?

Hollywood’s recent run of musician films seems to show more than just an interest in music. There is a clear fascination with the off-stage lives of artists, almost as if their personal stories alone are enough to draw an audience. From Timothee Chalamet’s sensational turn as Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown, the critically panned Back to Black, to Bradley Cooper’s Maestro, the pattern becomes hard to ignore. 

These films are well-made, most of the time, but more often than not, they simplify the complicated lives of these artists into something easy to digest, as is the trend with most forms of media today. They follow a structure that promises drama, success, and tragedy in expected order. Consequently, the artist’s individuality doesn’t get much space to show itself to a viewership. Instead, careers that were once unique and unpredictable are shaped into bite-sized iterations of the same story. 

Back to Black is a clear example of this. The film takes Amy Winehouse’s life and shrinks it down to a series of binges and heartbreaks. It strips her of any real agency, and her artistry — the sharpness, the innovation, the boldness of her voice — sinks into the background. Critics, like The Guardian, pointed out how the film flattens her life into failure, as if to say that that was all there was to it. 

And it’s not just this film. Maestro, with Bradley Cooper playing Leonard Bernstein, shows impressive acting, but ends up missing the bigger picture. Instead of showing Bernstein’s cultural and musical significance, it frames him within a rigid dramatic structure, as though he were a character following a script written by someone else.

Still, not every recent biopic falls into this pattern. James Mangold directed A Complete Unknown, for instance, doesn’t try to capture an entire life. It focuses instead on one singular moment in Bob Dylan’s career, the shift from folk to rock. The film doesn’t try to turn his story into a personal melodrama. It shows the tension of that shift, the sense of uncertainty, the excitement of artistic change. Timothée Chalamet simply brings out what makes Dylan unique, quietly and without trying too hard. The film shows that a biopic doesn’t need to depend on drama or spectacle to hold our attention.

Deliver Me From Nowhere follows a similar, more intricate and detailed path. It looks closely at the making of Springsteen’s album Nebraska, a time when everything seemed difficult. Jeremy Allen White doesn’t try to make his performance. Critics describe it as “utterly convincing.” He captures both the loneliness and the drive that Springsteen had at that moment, without turning it into something larger than it was. The film chooses to find its beauty in the process of the small, quiet struggles that shape an artist’s work. It shows that a biopic can be honest and truly as thoughtful and organic as possible, without compromising the quality of the piece itself.

The difference between these careful films and the broader trend in Hollywood is striking. Today’s music biopics often treat suffering as if it were the same thing as meaning. They give us emotional peaks, but don’t go much deeper than that. Most follow a familiar pattern: childhood trauma, rise to fame, personal collapse, redemption. Careers that were once messy or unpredictable are reduced to a single arc designed to appeal to awards voters.

That begs a bigger question. What is the purpose of the music biopic today? Is it supposed to show us the artist’s inner life, the process of making art, the individuality that made them stand out? Or has it become a tool to chase prestige, relying on spectacle and easy emotions? The difference matters because some films take the time to focus on specific creative periods, on how music changes both the artist and the audience. Some let the actors fully inhabit their roles, instead of giving us just the surface drama.

The recent wave of music biopics shows how much Hollywood likes making myths. But early responses to Deliver Me From Nowhere suggest there is still space for something real. There is still room for films that don’t flatten themselves and blindside their audience into easy-to-follow arcs. Filmmakers can tell stories that honour the music and the people who made it, without turning them into something they were not. 

The modern music biopic may lean heavily on formula, but films like A Complete Unknown indicate something far more important: that simple, careful storytelling can still make room for individuality.

Edited by Anish Paranjape

Krish Agarwal is a writer at Political Pandora’s Entertainment Department and a current high school student.

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References:

• The First Reviews for Jeremy Allen White’s ‘Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere’ Are Here.” Esquire, 1 Sept. 2025, www.esquire.com/uk/culture/film/a65949823/springsteen-deliver-me-from-nowhere-reviews/. 

• D’Souza, Shaad. “‘Her Demons Were Probably Worse’: Does Back to Black Reveal the Real Amy Winehouse?” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 9 Apr. 2024, www.theguardian.com/film/2024/apr/09/her-demons-were-probably-worse-does-back-to-black-reveal-the-real-amy-winehouse. 

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