A new film exploring Bruce Springsteen’s personal and creative struggles during the making of his stark 1982 album “Nebraska” delivers a brooding but flawed character study. While anchored by a dedicated lead performance, the movie often finds itself caught between gritty realism and familiar music-biopic conventions.
Jeremy Allen White fully commits to the role of Springsteen, capturing the singer’s intensity and internal conflict as he grapples with a period of profound artistic crisis. The film’s most compelling moments focus on the creation of “Nebraska,” a raw, acoustic project recorded on a simple tape machine in a New Jersey bedroom. This artistic departure stands in stark contrast to the commercial blockbuster that would soon follow, highlighting a pivotal moment of creative risk.
The supporting cast elevates the material where possible. Stephen Graham delivers a powerful, if brief, performance as Springsteen’s troubled father, with one particularly poignant dressing-room confrontation standing out as a highlight. Jeremy Strong brings his signature intensity to the role of manager Jon Landau, despite the character’s limited narrative scope.
However, the film frequently falls back on well-worn tropes. Black-and-white flashbacks to a difficult childhood, awe-struck recording studio sessions, and heavy-handed dialogue about “finding something real” prevent the story from achieving a truly fresh perspective. A more significant misstep is the introduction of a fictional romantic interest, a character whose presence feels manufactured to underscore the protagonist’s blue-collar authenticity rather than serve the core narrative.
Ultimately, the film presents a sincere but uneven portrait. It shines when focusing on the raw, unvarnished process of artistic creation but stumbles when layering on melodramatic fiction, leaving it stranded somewhere between a compelling character study and conventional fan service.
