Showbiz biopics too often disappoint because instead of providing insights on their subjects’ creative process they tend to focus on their personal trials and tribulations and end up little more than glorified soap operas with a few tunes attached.

For a while in this one, it seemed that would not be the case. It concentrates on what the musician went through in 1981-82 while creating and producing his stark, acoustic “Nebraska” album. But here’s the thing. Springsteen suffered from chronic depression, and director Scott Cooper, working from a book by Warren Zanes (who also penned the far superior “20 Feet from Stardom”) chooses to make this the film’s central theme.

Perhaps he thought this against-the-grain, artist-in-crisis, American gothic approach would appeal to, you know, the Boss’s truer fans. The director’s ambition to make something that isn’t just a greatest-hits juke-box musical is admirable, but the execution falls short, and the result is, forgive me, dour and more than a little boring.

On the plus side, Jeremy Allen White (The Bear), doing his own singing, mimics the star beautifully, and Jeremy Strong (Succession) as his producer and Stephen Graham as his abusive dad provide terrific supporting work.

It’s a valiant if not entirely successful attempt to understand the links between creativity and madness, a brooding, cerebral movie that lacks a clear dramatic arc and is ultimately not nearly as profound as it imagines itself to be. Well done for what it is, and ard-core fans will undoubtedly love it, but it never really transcends its central tortured-artist cliché.

(119 min)