11/25/2023 0 Comments Best movie endings match pointStill, the ending had her killed to tie it all up in atidy bow. Do you remember the Netflix film I Care a Lot with Rosamund Pike? Pike's character was deplorable but the film expected you to enjoy her amorality. See, she's suffering despite doing the work she was meant to do. Field doesn't let us ask the questions but provides the answers in a spoon-fed conclusion. Where does Lydia go from here? Does she self-destruct even further? Does she go on an apology tour? These are questions we could ask ourselves, to enrich our engagement. For 2+ hours Field puts the utmost faith in his audience, but abandons that faith right at the goal line.Įnding the film with the Bernstein tape puts ambiguity in the forefront. There can't be any ambiguity about how she might be tortured, we need to be shown. Instead, this previously observational film needs to editorialize to give us Lydia's punishment. If the film ends with Lydia crying over Bernstein, it's five stars all day. This is the story of a woman losing everything due to her professional and sexual naricism is one thing. One of the sticking points of the Code was the retribution of the criminal/villain. Enforcement of the code stiffled filmmakers in such drastic ways, you wonder what exceptional art could have been made if not for the puritanical enforcement of the Hays Code. Pre-code films get away with things you would never expect from films made in the 20s and 30s. Most of them have the dreaded Hays Code lingering over them. I have been watching a number of older films lately. This adds nothing to how we feel about Lydia, but it does make the audience feel that much better about karmic justice. Why hammer home her fall? The final 15 minutes only demonstrates the relative squalor she is now forced to live in when compared to her previous lavish lifestyle. Isn't enough that we know her life is in shambles?įield had an idea for the destruction of Lydia, but it feels as if he didn't know when to stop. The film ends as she conducts the orchestra score to a video game in a room filled with cosplayers.īut what is is the goal of the Asian prologue? Do we need to see some sort of righteous retribution? The audience is not exactly on Lydia's side after 2+ hours of her general misbehavior. She is still focused on her work, but she is alone and alienated. She is conducting a small orchestra in a warehouse. She returns to her Staten Island home and cries while watching tapes of her mentor, Leonard Bernstein.Īll of the sudden, Lydia is in Southeast Asia. With no other options, Lydia returns to New York to a crisis managment firm, who suggests she gets back to basics and lay low for a while. To add insult to injury, she bursts into the live performance she was supposed to conduct and embarasses herself further. Lydia is deposed, she loses her position in the orchestra, her reputation is in shambles, and her long-suffering wife Sharon (the even more exceptional Nina Hoss) leaves her - taking their daughter as a result. Lydia looks to her do-all assistant Francesca (an exceptional Noémie Merlant), but the conductor's professional ruthlessness has alienated Francesca as well. Investigations are formed depositions are scheduled. When Krista, one of her conquests, commits suicide, the gears of justice begin to turn. Lydia had spent her career honing her craft to a razor's sharpness, but also left sexual conquests and professional misconduct in her wake. There's constant tension, threats, ominous sounds, and deflections. SPOILERS AHEAD - READ ONLY IF YOU'VE SEEN TÁR.įor 2+ hours, Field and Blanchett crafted this difficult and complex character destined for a fall from grace. Nothing was missing.īut then we reached the last 15 minutes. The tone, the supporting players, the drama, the comedy. It might be my new number one of the year! Everything was working. The next two hours were magical, transfixing. Then we get Lydia Tár's introduction and her interview with Adam Gopnik. Rave after rave of Cate Blanchett's performance piqued my interest but I wanted to go in with fresh eyes so I didn't read them. I can't say I went into Todd Field's TÁR, only his third film, with any sort of expectations.
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