The glib, memefied synopsis of “Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere” is that “men will literally record the album “Nebraska” before going to therapy.” But that makes it sound more interesting than Scott Cooper’s film is. While “Deliver Me From Nowhere” eschews many music biopic traps as it focuses on a very specific time in the artist’s life and explores how Springsteen realized he needed help with lots of unresolved issues, the movie surrounding it is dramatically inert and visually dull. There is no real imagination at work in this telling which is an awful tact as so much of it is an internalized struggle (at least when certain characters aren’t literally describing the subtext and exposition), so instead it’s just Jeremy Alan White looking off into the middle distance with a slightly furrowed brow for like 30% of the runtime. “Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere” is all potential, with some good elements thrown in, but mostly wasted in an awkward and uninspired execution.
It’s 1982 and, hot off the success of his album “The River,” Bruce Springsteen (Jeremy Alan White) is wrapping up his tour and thinking about what’s next. While the record company pressures his manager, Jon Landau (Jeremy Strong), for more hits, the musician rents a house in the New Jersey suburbs and begins working. He reads Flannery O’Connor, watches 1973’s “Badlands,” and finds himself constantly ruminating on his turbulent childhood with an alcoholic father (Stephen Graham) and put upon mother (Gaby Hoffman). While in seclusion, he begins a romantic relationship with Faye (Odessa Young), a single mother who seems uninterested in the fame and fortune of the ascending star. When Springsteen finally starts laying down tracks in the home, it’s a stark departure from the raucous rock ‘n’ roll of his previous efforts and may be a difficult sell to those around him. And while exploring these darker themes in his music, something starts to shake loose within the troubled singer/songwriter.
It’s hard to talk about any music biopic without mentioning 2007’s “Walk Hard,” the parody film that exquisitely mocked the many motifs in which these dramatized movies constantly traffic. “Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere” avoids many of these pitfalls and punchlines. But there’s still plenty of childhood trauma to mine and insistent profundity in the challenges that Springsteen faces. Writer/director Scott Cooper (working from a book by Warren Zanes) still embraces too many of these biographical cliches and is ill-equipped to competently address the larger issue of depression which looms over the film. “Better Man” is a flawed movie, but it at least took visual and thematic chances in its depiction of Robbie Williams’ struggles so as to feel fresh, even as it retread the familiar rock star problems. “Delivere Me From Nowhere” has no real flair in its imagery or any other aspects of how it tells its (potentially very interesting) tale. An incredibly talented person coming to grips with their depression while also creating a masterpiece of their career is something that hasn’t really been explored elsewhere. But here it’s constantly shuffled about in importance and emphasis, with languid scenes either of Springsteen looking forlorn or Jon Landau literally describing the emotional situation that his friend is experiencing. “He feels guilty” or “this is very dark” or other such bits of subtextual exposition is clumsily penned just in case people aren’t following along. And rather than letting the music and lyrics and all of that speak for itself in some inventive way, we just get a lot of Greek choruses telling us how Springsteen is feeling and how we should feel about that.
The performances in “Deliver Me From Nowhere” are solid and trying the best they can while clearly being held back by the poor writing and flaccid direction. Jeremy Alan White retains an excellent quiet intensity of his Springsteen that only seems to shed when he’s on stage performing. Despite getting some truly awkward dialogue, Strong is good as the faithful Landau and the rest of the cast does as well as possible — even Young is emotionally earnest in a terribly underwritten part (that may be because Faye is a composite of different people, who can say?). But even with these strong turns, there’s only so much that can be done with ham-fisted dialogue and awkwardly paced scenarios.
This is compounded by the fact that there really isn’t that much external conflict in “Deliver Me From Nowhere.” Well, “Nebraska” was a major departure in sound for Springsteen, surely there were lots of drag out fights over it? Not really, no — there’s a scene where The Boss insists this is the album he wants to put out and Landau goes along with it. But obviously the record label would freak out over this album, especially with Springsteen’s insistence on lack of press, lack of singles, and no tour? Again, not really; it’s one scene and even then, the executive just acquiesces to the demand.
The problem is that the real drama should be the internal issues that Springsteen experiences and confronts. That’s clearly what Cooper wants “Deliver Me From Nowhere” to be about, but, unfortunately, it’s rendered in the most boring and cliché ways that even such a novel idea is devoid of any real strength. There are moments of unique insight and entertainment in “Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere” but most of it is buried under languid filmmaking that it barely registers. It took a lot of soul searching and imagination for Springsteen to make “Nebraska”; it’s a pity that the movie about it lacks those elements completely.
2 / 5 Stars
Directed by: Scott Cooper
Starring: Jeremy Alan White, Jeremy Strong, Odessa Young, Stephen Graham, Gaby Hoffman, Paul Walter Hauser
