Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere

“In yourself right now is all the place you've got”.

In the endless lineup of biopics, we’ve now reached Bruce Springsteen — one of the pioneers of American heartland rock, an icon, and probably one of those who truly define what it means to be an “American artist”. Scott Cooper takes the director’s chair and Jeremy Allen White steps into the role of the legendary musician. The question is — did anything interesting come out of this biopic? Let’s break it down.

The premise is... well... basic. It’s another story about an artist on the verge of releasing his greatest, most iconic work, preparing for the breakthrough moment of his career. The story begins with Bruce Springsteen touring The River — his fifth studio album — when he was already successful and respected, but not yet a megastar. The film focuses on how he was searching for himself, battling his inner demons, and trying to write new music — a process that actually led to two albums born from the same recording session. Those albums, of course, became the two most important in his career: Nebraska and Born in the U.S.A., the latter of which catapulted him to legendary status.

As a music critic, I have to be noisy for just a second to point out that Nebraska — with its raw, cassette-recorded sound and deep emotional core — is more important than the blockbuster Born in the U.S.A. But we love both, respect both, and still listen to both.

In this film, we get the story of a cult artist facing depression, childhood trauma, and the long process of breaking free from the need for validation from an abusive father. It’s the story of a visionary — one of the best songwriters in the industry — and a look into his creative process: what it cost him, how he searched for new approaches, and how he reshaped music in ways that others later tried to imitate.

Here we’ve got the full biopic package: rejection, daddy issues, depression, failed love, identity crisis, suffering, talent, a label pressuring the artist, and — surprisingly — a manager who actually cares. Big thanks to Jeremy Strong for that performance. But in the end, this is such a standardized biopic that it could’ve been cut and pasted from another movie. It’s basically the same formula we saw last year with A Complete Unknown starring Timothée Chalamet. Huge respect to Jeremy Allen White for his portrayal and for singing the songs himself — that’s really cool. But the issue is that the film looks too perfect. Every frame feels overly designed. You look at a supposedly 1980s scene — the furniture, the lighting, the set design — and you can see how carefully everything was placed, down to the millimeter. That precision makes it look very artificial.

The story itself is clear and relatable, but also too melodramatic, too obvious, revealing nothing truly new. The time jumps between Bruce’s childhood and adulthood are predictable, and the film never really finds that emotional hook that would justify its existence and massive budget.

So what we end up with is a touching, perfectly fine story — but nothing more than “okay”. In today’s world, oversaturated with musical biopics, that’s just not enough to stand out.

6.5/10