Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere (2025)

Starring: Jeremy Allen White, Jeremy Strong, Odessa Young, Stephen Graham, et al.

Directed By: Scott Cooper

Where It’s Available: Disney Plus (all territories)

Here’s something you may know about me - Bruce Springsteen is my favourite musician of all-time. His songs about working-class struggle and fighting through loss to see just a little bit of sunshine really resonate with my own lower-class upbringing. I’ve seen him in concert four times. I own at least 10 Springsteen vinyls. So when they announced a biopic for Bruce - specifically one with another personal favourite, Jeremy Allen White (of FX’s spectacular ‘The Bear’) - it was a foregone conclusion that I would watch this film. And it might be difficult for me to be truly objective about it. With that said, it pleases me to state that the stands as a solid - if a little rote and formulaic - biopic.

Setting the film during a specific time period of Bruce’s life (late 1981 through mid 1982 - just after he finished his world tour supporting ‘The River’, while he recorded his 1982 classic record ‘Nebraska’) is purposeful in the hope that it lets the script and the cast settle in a little deeper, rather than painting with a big brush and glossing over huge chunks of an artist’s life (As an example, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ is a great film, but there are huge swaths of Freddie’s life that are effectively ignored because fitting 50 years into a 2 hour film can be… difficult, to say the least). This time period is also representative of Bruce’s last gasp at a ‘normal’ life, before rock mega stardom turned him into a household name. He still plays guitar with a bar band on weekends to relax. He dates a sister of one of his friends from high school (Faye - played by Odessa Young - is a composite character representing the different women who were a part of Bruce’s life during this time period). His well-meaning agent / friend Jon Landau (Jeremy Strong) navigates the business end of Bruce’s artistic career - the label just got their first top-ten single with ‘Hungry Heart’ and are definitely hungry for more.

Ultimately though, the film is centred - and is at its best - when it’s focused on Bruce’s artistic struggle to bring his music to life. ‘Nebraska’ was recorded in a bedroom of Bruce’s home in New Jersey - famously one of the first major label home recordings in history. He wrote a huge swath of songs in that same time period, but the tracks that stayed on the album (including ‘Nebraska’, ‘Mansion on the Hill’, ‘Atlantic City’, etc) all center around  a deep sense of longing, loss and despair. Many Springsteen scholars consider it to be Bruce’s most personal album, and spending time with Bruce as he sits alone in his house, penning lyrics on a notepad, strumming a guitar… it fits the vibe of the record and stands out, and I wish that some parts of the film (The love story with ‘Faye’ is cute - and Odessa Young does well enough in the role - but it just sounds like a studio note that ‘Bruce needs a love interest here’… when his real love is his music) were simply set aside in order to spend more time with the music. A great example of this is when they’re in the studio, having just finished cutting ‘Born in the USA’ (yes, ‘that’ song was originally part of the batch that Bruce wrote in this time period - along with a lot of the other tracks that would eventually become the 1984 ‘Born in the USA’ album). Everyone agrees the track slaps. But Bruce is focused on the acoustic arrangement and moody vibe of the ‘Nebraska’ tracks and basically says to shelve it. Paul Walter Hauser, as Bruce’s guitar tech Mike Batlan exclaims rather despondently, “Aww… I liked ‘Born in the USA’” Me too, Mike. Me too.

The Good: Jeremy Allen White plays Bruce as charming, an introspective and quite vulnerable. A man who isn’t quite sure how to come to terms with his fame. Bruce himself famously struggled with this as well - ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town’ (my favourite Springsteen album) is dark and moody - in direct defiance to the bombastic, buoyant and uplifting ‘Born to Run’ that really launched his career. Nebraska, in turn, is a response to the reaction of Hungry Heart becoming his first Top-10 single. His depression and impostor syndrome almost drive his music, which can be both powerful and heartbreaking as a result. White sings a little bit in the film and does a very good job at least matching the tone, if not the timbre in his voice.

The Bad: Jeremy Strong is a good actor. He has been nominated for multiple Emmy’s for his role in Succession. But for the life of me, I have no idea what kind of accent he’s pulling out here for his role of Jon Landau. It’s like, some wild mishmash of New York Jew mixed with mafia mob boss…? It doesn’t work for me, and I found myself focusing more on his accent than the actual scenes he was involved in.

The Ugly: White mimics Bruce’s manic stage presence quite well - one scene near the beginning of the film shows him backstage with literal puddles of sweat pooling at his feet following a performance. They say he’s the hardest working man in rock and roll and you definitely believe it.

Is It Okay For Kids?: Sure. My son has, not surprisingly, grown up surrounded by Bruce’s music. But Nebraska isn’t one that I play much when we’re in the car (outside of Atlantic City, there aren’t many singalongs, as you can imagine). Parental guidance is advised, of course (there are a couple of more difficult flashback sequences regarding Bruce’s complicated relationship with his father that should be talked about) but nothing outright disqualifying here. Now whether an 8 year old would WANT to watch a biopic about a depressed rock and roll star singing songs from 44 years ago is another story altogether.

The Verdict: Despite being burdened with an unnecessary love story subplot and one of the most oftputting film accents in recent history, ‘Deliver Me From Nowhere’ tells a solid story about Bruce’s difficulties in excavating ‘Nebraska’ from his pen, paper and bedroom studio to the number three album in America. It also shines when it focuses on Bruce’s mental state (his depression here is a key focal point, and not shockingly why the album is so dark and despondent). Jeremy Allen White cuts a mean rug and Stephen Graham plays Bruce’s father with the right amount of gravitas and menace. Somewhere, in some parallel universe, there is a fantastic version of this movie. As it stands it’s a decent way to spend two hours, particularly if you’re a fan of The Boss. 7/10.