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Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere is an uncanny portrayal of the rock music legend

If you watch Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere for any reason, make it Jeremy Allen White’s uncanny, nuanced performance as ‘the Boss’. It’s a pity, though, that the film as a whole is too low-key for its own good, falling short on enthralling drama to match the consistent intensity of the actor’s work.

Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen in 20th Century Studios' Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere. (Photo: Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios)

By Noelle Adams

31 Oct 2025

There’s a point in new musical biography Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere where a record executive describes Bruce Springsteen’s

style="font-weight: 400;">Nebraska album as something he can appreciate, but says he’s also not sure who it’s for.

That’s a sentiment applicable to Deliver Me from Nowhere as a whole, which emerges as a well-made drama that is nonetheless too introspective and leisurely to be a crowd pleaser, and too clunkily obvious to appeal to the arthouse audience.

Longtime fans of the Boss should enjoy it, though, or at least gain deeper insight into the celebrated rock musician.

Instead of chronicling Springsteen’s entire career, Deliver Me from Nowhere zooms in on one professional and personal turning point — using as its basis the book of the same name by Warren Zanes.

In 1981, Bruce Springsteen (played as an adult by

style="font-weight: 400;">The Bear’s Jeremy Allen White) was poised for global stardom. As expected, while on a much-needed break following a successful tour, and holed up in rural New Jersey, he started writing his next album.

What was unexpected, though, was the form the new record took. While it did birth anthems like

style="font-weight: 400;">Born in the USA, Nebraska released as an acoustic folk album, in which Springsteen processed his blue collar roots, and complicated relationship with his father Douglas (Stephen Graham), a man with his own demons.

For some, Nebraska was so much of a departure — it was largely recorded unaccompanied on a four-track cassette recorder at home — that they considered it professional procrastination on Springsteen’s part; a running from his rockstar destiny. For Bruce, it was a period of navigating his own identity, as fame, public expectation, personal doubts and messy reality all battled it out in his head.

On paper, that sounds compelling, but the actual execution in Deliver Me from Nowhere isn’t as dynamic or engaging.

There are moments that lock you in, certainly. The black-and-white flashbacks to Springsteen’s youth are charged with dangerous energy, thanks to the temperamental Douglas. The live performance scenes are also electric, coming across as Bruce’s sweaty, all-in catharsis, and an escape from his oppressive thoughts when left in silence. It’s even fascinating to see how the recording engineers solved the quandary of making a home recording LP quality.

Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen in 20th Century Studios' SPRINGSTEEN DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE. (Photo:Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios) — Jeremy Allen White excels as Bruce Springsteen in Deliver Me From Nowhere. (Photo: Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios)

Then, of course, there’s the hook of White’s performance, given the thumbs-up by Springsteen himself. Instead of being layered in prosthetics, White’s transformation into the Boss is achieved in far more subtle, but no less convincing ways.

A few physical tweaks, like contact lenses, help to accomplish the physical look, but Bruce Springsteen really “comes alive” through mannerisms captured via carefully selected camera angles by director Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart). For the record, White does his own instrument playing and singing in the movie, and feels like a shoe-in for an Oscar nomination this awards season.

So maybe there is an audience for Deliver Me from Nowhere after all. If you love uncanny portrayals of famous figures, the film is a massive success. However, White’s performance isn’t enough to carry the whole project. Granted, the movie presents a sincere and grounded depiction of reality, and its early Eighties aesthetic is spot-on, but the narrative feels short on enthralling drama, leaving things flat and uninvolving.

For example, there’s very little pushback on Springsteen’s insistences regarding the release of Nebraska. Also, for covering such a small period, the film has a strong sense of being divided into chapters.

Odessa Young as Faye in 20th Century Studios' SPRINGSTEEN DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE. (Photo: Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios) — Odessa Young as Faye in Deliver Me From Nowhere. (Photo: Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios)

Jeremy Strong as Jon Landau in 20th Century Studios' SPRINGSTEEN DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE. (Photo: Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios) — Jeremy Strong as Springsteen's friend and manager Jon Landau. (Photo: Macall Polay / 20th Century Studios)

Odessa Young’s love interest fades away, while audiences are three-quarters through the movie before depression in the Springsteen family is mentioned. Brought up earlier in the two-hour runtime, viewers might have been keyed to look for certain things.

With events rolling quietly along, it often falls to Jeremy Strong, as Jon Landau, Springsteen’s supportive manager, producer and friend, to spell things out through heavy-handed dialogue.

Again, while you can appreciate the filmmakers’ decision to adopt a low-key, contemplative and intimate approach, it doesn’t quite work in execution. It provides access into the inner workings of its titular music icon, but if you had to rank Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere among more recent rock biopics for crowd-pleasing accessibility and emotional satisfaction, it slots beneath glossy