TAR : Monday 16th January 2023.

I saw the M rated 'TAR' at Sydney's Open Air Cinema at Mrs. Macquarie's Point overlooking the Sydney Opera House, Harbour Bridge and the city skyline, on Monday evening this week, ten days ahead of its Australian release on 26th January. This psychological drama film is Written, Co-Produced and Directed by Todd Field whose previous two feature film making credits are his 2001 debut with 'In the Bedroom' and his 2006 'Little Children' which between them garnered the Writer/Director three Academy Award nominations, plus a further thirty award wins and another 108 nominations from around the awards and festival circuit for his complete body of work so far, including 'Tar'. This film saw its World Premier screening at the Venice International Film Festival in early September last year and its wide release in the US from the end of October, where it has so far recovered US$6.5M from its production budget of US$35M and has generated universal critical acclaim. 'Tar' has so far won fifty-six awards and another 200 nominations (some of which are still pending a final outcome).

The film opens up with 49 year-old celebrity virtuoso Lydia Tar (Cate Blanchett who also Co-Produces here) who is a multi award winning composer, only one of fifteen people to win the coveted EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony) Awards and the first female chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, being interviewed by Adam Gopnik (Adam Gopnik) at The New Yorker Festival. During the course of the interview she promotes a number of upcoming new projects, including her pending live recording of Mahler's Fifth Symphony and her new autobiographical book 'Tar on Tar'. Lydia relies heavily on Francesca Lentini (Noemie Merlant) her Personal Assistant and former lover to manage her affairs, and Sharon Goodnow (Nina Hoss), her concertmaster violinist and wife. Later, Lydia has lunch with Eliot Kaplan (Mark Strong) an investment banker and conductor who with Lydia co-founded the Accordion Foundation to support and nurture aspiring female conductors. Amongst other things they discuss the interview, her technique, replacing Lydia's assistant conductor Sebastian Brix (Allan Corduner), and filling a vacant cello position in Berlin.

Lydia guest lectures a small graduate masterclass at the Juilliard School. She mocks the black indigenous person of colour and pangender student Max (Zethphan Smith-Gneist) for not taking interest in white composers like J. S. Bach, encouraging students to look past superficial differences and focus on the music itself. Max angrily storms out of the class. Before returning to Berlin, Lydia receives a package delivered to her at her hotel of a first edition of Vita Sackville-West's 1923 novel 'Challenge' from Krista Taylor (Sylvia Flote), a former Accordion fellow. 

Before a blind audition for the cello position, Lydia comes across young Russian hopeful Olga Metkina (Sophie Kauer) in the female toilets. Lydia is attracted to Olga and subsequently treats her favourably over others, including granting her a coveted soloist position in the companion piece to Mahler's Fifth, Edward Elgar's Cello Concerto. As Lydia intensively prepares for the recording, her relationships with Francesca and Sharon grows increasingly strained, as both can see her attraction to Olga. 

After increasingly frequent and desperate e-mails to Francesca, Krista commits suicide, and Lydia instructs Francesca to delete any and all text and e-mail correspondence from or about Krista and retains a lawyer, as Krista's parents plan to sue. Lydia informs Sebastian of his imminent replacement. He is naturally incensed, indicates that the orchestra is aware of her favouritism, and speculates that Francesca will be his replacement. Unperturbed by the accusations, Lydia remarks that she intends to replace Sebastian with a different candidate. Without advising Lydia, Francesca suddenly and without warning resigns upon learning that she will not be promoted. 

One day after rehearsing Olga's solo, Lydia drives her home, but Olga inadvertently leaves a small teddy bear behind in the car. Lydia calls after her but she does not hear so she follows her into an abandoned, dilapidated apartment building. Spooked by a dog in the basement, Lydia runs out of the building trips and injures herself on a set os stone steps that she was hurriedly climbing. She gets home where Sharon treats her facial wounds and lies to her wife and the orchestra the next day, claiming the injuries were from an assault by an unknown male assailant. 

An edited, out-of-context video of Lydia's earlier Juilliard class in which she admonishes Max goes viral, and an article with accusations against her appears in the New York Post. Lydia, accompanied by Olga, returns to New York to attend a deposition for Krista's lawsuit and to promote her book, where she is met by placard wielding angry protestors. During the deposition, it is implied that Francesca has shared damning e-mails with the plaintiffs. The Kaplan Foundation cuts its ties with Lydia. Olga declines Lydia's dinner invitation, saying that she is jet lagged and is going to sleep, but instead sneaks out dressed up to the nines for a night out on the town. 

Back in Berlin, Lydia is removed as conductor. Furious over the allegations, but more so at Lydia's lack of communication, Sharon bars Lydia from seeing their adopted six year old daughter Petra (Mila Bogojevic). Lydia retreats to her old studio and gradually becomes increasingly depressed. At the live recording of Mahler's Fifth Symphony she physically punches and kicks her replacement, before being restrained by two burly security guards and the sounds of disbelief coming from the packed concert hall. Lydia is told to lay low by her management company, and so she returns to her working-class childhood home on Staten Island, where it is revealed that her birth name is Linda Tarr by her brother Tony who chastises her for turning her back on her roots.

Sometime later, Lydia finds work conducting in the Philippines. Seeking a massage to ease her jet lag, she asks the concierge at the low-end hotel she is staying in for a recommendation. She is sent to a high-end brothel, where she is directed to select an escort from the 'fishbowl' where numerous young women are seated in a chamber orchestra-like formation, all with their eyes lowered towards the floor. One woman with the number five pinned to her chest stares into Lydia's eyes, her position the same as Olga's. Lydia rushes outside to vomit on the side of the street. With her new orchestra, Lydia conducts the score for the video game series 'Monster Hunter' before an audience of avid cosplayers. 

'Tar' is a very well made film and worthy of all the accolades bestowed up on it. Here Director, Writer and Producer Todd Field has crafted a film that takes us from the very pinnacle of Lydia's career when it appears she can do no wrong to the very depth's of her career when she is cast asunder and to all intents and purposes, cancelled! Cate Blanchett's performance is outstanding and rivetingly nuanced as she goes from the very highs of her conducting and musical scoring expertise to the depth's of despair having lost almost everything and starting over in the Philippines, all alone in the world. The energy, emotion and complexity with which she imbues her character, not to mention the 10% or so of her dialogue delivered in German, is exemplary and puts Blanchett firmly on a trajectory for Oscar glory later this year, having already won the Golden Globe and Critics Choice Awards for Best Actress earlier this month. My only criticism of the film is that at a two-and-a-half hour+ run time it does drag its heels in places and becomes just a tad repetitive. This film won't be for everyone, but for those more mature audience members looking for a break from the horror, action and Superhero fare offered up by studio's these days, you can't go far wrong with 'Tar'. 

'Tar' warrants four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps. 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-