Tár
I finally caught up with Cate Blanchett in Tár. What a stunning performance. Tár is clearly a monster in the long tradition of egotistical artists believing that they can do no wrong and Blanchett manages to be both watchable and awful. A film about cancel culture and power, I can’t decide whether putting a woman in that position was a cop out or stroke of genius, or maybe just being provocative*. It lays out the problem in the early scenes with the student Max, and it’s clear from then where this will go. My main gripe with the film is not that Lydia Tár is too big for her boots, but, appropriately I suppose, that the film is too. There were nice little flashes of wit throughout, and the denouement did make me smile, but the whole was dragged down by being overlong and the script and dialogue a little too pleased with itself. I suppose it could be just being a bit meta with all the pretentiousness but it did get ...