TÁR, the cancel culture conversation piece of the year starring Cate Blanchett and Nina Hoss and directed by Todd Field

Also, the very idea that I'm actually wrestling with a Todd Fucking Field movie means I too am getting my just desserts

i had the opposite reaction as tavi g. both tár's partner (nina hoss) and her assistant francesca (noemie merlant) were wet blankets--jealous, petty, all anxious concerned expressions and worried furrowed brows--while lydia is fabulous and ebullient. her deep connection to music gives her terrestrial presences a delightful levity. even her slam poetry-inflected boomer rant in the "pangender BIPOC" scene is, against all odds, kind of a banger. the scene where she threatens the kid in german--so good! she also wears great outfits throughout

framing one's whole reaction to the movie around the assumption that lydia is an "abuser" misses the fact that the movie is (imho quite intentionally) highly ambiguous about whether she was abusive at all. it leaves out key details of her relationships with krista and francesca, and the scene where olga vulgarly slurps her food cuts against the assumption that their relationship is an abuse of power; if anything olga is the one using tar. it's (not that subtly) making a "meta" point about cancel culture in turning the audience against lydia without actually showing us anything incriminating

Tár also made Hoss and Merlant into wet blankets, to be clear: she ground them down.

yes. and flops, one of the central points of that essay, and at least in my opinion one of the strengths of the film, is that the film allows us to render a fairly firm judgment despite deliberately leaving key pieces of information uncorroborated, at least literally speaking. I suppose field could have shown us scenes of krista prior to her death, or her parents confronting lydia in court, but would this really have added anything to the film? has anyone come across a review that genuinely seems to think lydia is innocent?

whoops that was supposed to be spoiler tag, I’m getting old

How Todd Fucking Field made a movie about a guilty person and asked, "How can we still have fun?" is the most surprising thing about Tár .

i don't think the BIPOC scene is at all well handled content-wise* but you come out of it (well i came out of it) already knowing that LT was a bully who absolutely shouldn't be teaching even if her antagonist was basically delivered as a twerp pulling studenty stunts. i fully disliked lydia from then on and was hoping for the comeuppance she deserved.

*bcz there's several real issues to it, and they're delivered as no more than hurried cartoons (actually on both sides, tho lydia's has far the better delivery mainly bcz cate). of course the entire movie is a very controlled cartoon and that's good -- but it's mainly a different kind of cartoon

as observed above this entire strand to me feels like minor business sellotaped in at the last minute, like field belatedly felt it "had to be there" but didn't then put the work in to ensure it wasn't basically a red herring (while also helping himself over-painlessly to a plot point or two plus some handy arc machinery). my guess is that he felt the (to repeat: belated) work needed fleshing out this conflict and the real issues attached, wd overset the tone and content of the rest of the film (and i think he's right).

That trembling knee is the equivalent of Captain Queeg and the steel ball.

i mean he's called queeg

Knowing that the movie had a "cancel culture" angle, I spent the first half waiting for something to come of the Juilliard scene (which is fairly early). I kept thinking, "Look at Tar, oblivious to what's about to happen." But when it does come, it seems relatively inconsequential on its own, or at least it has a slightly different import than one might have predicted from the original scene: It's leaked to support the accusations against Tar in the context of Krista's suicide, as an example of her imperiousness and abuse of power. The Bach/BIPOC stuff is superficially salacious, but it's not really the point.

In fact, while I was anticipating the consequences of the Juilliard scene, the movie was quietly demonstrating how all of Tar's relationships and interactions are suffused with perverse power dynamics, but this becomes apparent only through accretion because the movie withholds other people's perspectives. In some ways, I feel like the Juilliard scene is almost intentionally heavy-handed, to show that her character's real abuses are more insidious.

I guess I'm saying that it is kind of a red herring! But not completely unrelated to the broader revelations.

Another comparison to Östlund: https://boxd.it/3tcs3V

Maybe people genuinely, genuinely think this guy is the shit. But... I very much doubt this movie has a second and third life in the discourse cycle. It's disposable. TÁR was a little calculated for me but it's a high masterpiece next to Triangle of Sadness and I'm glad I saw them on consecutive days to be able to further appreciate what the Todd Field has to offer.

yes. and flops, one of the central points of that essay, and at least in my opinion one of the strengths of the film, is that the film allows us to render a fairly firm judgment despite deliberately leaving key pieces of information uncorroborated, at least literally speaking. I suppose field could have shown us scenes of krista prior to her death, or her parents confronting lydia in court, but would this really have added anything to the film? has anyone come across a review that genuinely seems to think lydia is innocent?

― k3vin k., Saturday, November 26, 2022 7:46 AM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

ya idk i disagree. i felt see that the film is trying really hard to do the opposite, to keep the judgment ambiguous. from an interview with todd fields

The film is an examination of a downfall, recognition, and even potential rebuild of an artist abusing power that they’ve gained over time. How difficult was it to create a balance on this issue without tilting your hand to one side or the other when making it? And do you think the audience should remain neutral when looking at Lydia and her actions?

TF: I think the audience has to do what the audience wants to do. We built this thing for a very particular purpose. We built this thing so that there was the ability to ask questions about her behavior and to have a real stake in your feelings about it, whether you judged her one way or the other, or maybe you changed your mind about her, or…

When Monika Willi and I were editing, we were out in the middle of nowhere working seven-day weeks, and when we would watch the film down, at different points, we would always turn to each other and say the same thing. It was, “How did you feel about her today?” And sometimes those feelings would be very contradictory from the previous viewing. So, it wasn’t like… We really tried to approach it, if I can be so bold as to say, in a humble way, which is that we weren’t trying to draw any lines about… We weren’t looking for outcome, we weren’t looking to do equational narrative. We were looking for as much possibility of interpretation as possible. Not to be intentionally vague or obscure or anything like that, just that all of it was available, and there’s no wrong answer, you know?

the real controversy is not about whether lydia tár is abusive, a bad person, cancel-worthy, etc., but whether she is a real person

I really don’t think that quote contradicts anything that I or others have been saying! but I will concede that the film takes on a hot-button topic in an unconventional, decidedly non-didactic way, and that it is not gonna please everyone!

I finally watched this and I loved it so goddamn much.

the real controversy is not about whether lydia tár is abusive, a bad person, cancel-worthy, etc., but whether she is a real person

― flopson, Saturday, November 26, 2022 2:14 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I felt like the first moment of this movie, Adam Gopnik’s introduction, made it very clear that this was an entirely fantastical character. It felt similar to a buildup in a horror movie. Do people really believe a person like this could exist? Should they have gone even further and had her conduct the first symphony from space or something?

i knew it was fiction going in but the friend i watched it with who went in completely blind asked me "wait, so is she not a real person?" after we saw it. it's also become a bit of a meme https://www.thecut.com/2022/10/lydia-tar-is-not-real.html

xp k3v- one of the things i like about it is that a reaction like mine (fawning over tar) and mark s's (rooting for her downfall) are both possible. as you said "the film allows us to render a fairly firm judgment despite deliberately leaving key pieces of information uncorroborated", but imo the same limited information also allows you to not

I had no idea that the last moment was anything other than a fantasy (not knowing what she was conducting or why the audience looked that way), until reading up on it afterwards.

The scene where she tries to follow the cellist home also felt unreal, so now I want to see the whole movie again from the point of view that she wasn't falling into some hallucinatory madness.

Also would like to watch this as a double feature with Black Swan.

asking "do people really believe a person like this could exist?" but pointing crossly towards adam gopnik

I loved this. odd reactions as expected up above from those who didn't actually watch the film. the film does a good job making it clear that she was an abuser without having to get explicit (ie: there is no doubt that she should not have done whatever it is she did to Krista, even though it's also somewhat apparent Krista was not a stable person). The surreal elements were well done, and really recalled Eyes Wide Shut to me, and I'd honestly forgotten who Todd Field was!

i knew it was fiction going in but the friend i watched it with who went in completely blind asked me "wait, so is she not a real person?" after we saw it. it's also become a bit of a meme https://www.thecut.com/2022/10/lydia-tar-is-not-real.html

― flopson, Saturday, November 26, 2022 5:45 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

I know that Lydia Tar is fictional, but she doesn't do anything that hasn't been done in real life by 1) a male conductor or 2) a male film director. (With the likely exception of a conductor tackling the second, in front of an audience.)

The Juilliard student is a strawman (strawperson?), but his dialogue is rooted in discourse I've seen elsewhere, challenging the canon and who decides what is canonical. I didn't see Whiplash, but in that I understand the cruel teacher is supposed to be the hero for expecting no less than 115% from the student?

Hmm: https://slate.com/culture/2022/12/tar-cate-blanchett-movie-ending-explained-analyzed.html

Maybe?

That sounds like a more interesting movie than the one I'd been reading about until now. Might need to rent it from Amazon.

that's how I watched it last month

that's the first piece i've seen that grapples with that aspect of the movie in even a remotely satisfactory way.

Honestly, I buy it and I never would’ve thought Todd Field capable of even a modestly successful stylistic flourish until tecently

Enjoyed that essay. Definitely agree that a lot of the elements identified feel like they intentionally don't add up or can't be resolved in the mode of a realistic what-you-see-is-what-happened-to-the-characters narrative.

i hadn't noticed the shots with lydia lurking in the background when i watched this but yikes--they're scary!

https://compote.slate.com/images/03911a57-319b-4a5a-8f71-1c02d2e3858f.gif?crop=538%2C358%2Cx0%2Cy0&width=1600

Honestly, I buy it and I never would’ve thought Todd Field capable of even a modestly successful stylistic flourish until tecently

― عباس کیارستمی (Eric H.), Thursday, December 8, 2022 9:14 PM (twenty-eight minutes

Hence my rechristening him.

"it's mostly supernatural" also neatly accounts for Mark Strong's astounding hair

strong's agent his written "terrible syrups whenever possible" into all his contracts for years

also relevant:

Leonard Bernstein getting frustrated. pic.twitter.com/QVZ20t6qUL

— composers doing normal shit (@NormalComposers) December 9, 2022

i don't really buy the supernatural element as a full-on "explanation" of the last chunk of the movie but i appreciate it as another wrinkle. it definitely did not occur to me at all.

didn't occur to me while watching the movie, that is

theres certainly more going on than what initially meets the eye, but "supernatural" is not a word i would introduce into the conversation

how about "weird"

this film is much weirder than it initially seems, and weirder than most people realize, I think

especially if you add, "and it's by the guy who made In the Bedroom."

i mean it's repulsion if deneuve was playing a lady that could impress adam fkn gopnik, the more that was going on was only not initially meeting the eye if u like dozed off

i read it more as funny than spooky bcz the various horror interludes were very extra w/o being very effective (as horror), but i very much enjoyed the ending (seems like he's better at funny, and cate is v funny too)

this film is much weirder than it initially seems, and weirder than most people realize, I think

this was my feeling after seeing it (not that I have it figured out), and I was frustrated trying to find reviews that had a handle on it.

i read it more as funny than spooky bcz the various horror interludes were very extra w/o being very effective (as horror), but i very much enjoyed the ending (seems like he's better at funny, and cate is v funny too)

agree with this too! though was expecting something more...cathartic, as it approached the end but the way it did go was really funny/weird/interesting.

the rather oblique reference to Apocalypse Now (I think...) in the final section is really suggestive too.

Yeah, I love how thrown-away that line was

i think i’m TÁR-pilled. great movie

— b-boy bouiebaisse (@jbouie) December 10, 2022

the smarts are liking this movie

https://thefilmstage.com/the-tar-cinematic-universe-will-expand-with-new-short-film-by-todd-field/

Jár pic.twitter.com/McXnTh1IRq

— Joe Whitt (@joeobligations) December 19, 2022

wtf at that Slate piece
I felt the film could easily have been written for a male lead by the way, I can imagine a production meeting with someone saying “hey, hey, but what if Cate Blanchett??!??”

oh https://www.avclub.com/cate-blanchett-says-tar-role-originally-meant-for-a-man-1849872103

not a good one imo

Good luck figuring out the interlude where Lydia, who winds up in the Philippines when her life falls apart, visits a masseuse recommended by the desk clerk at her hotel and finds herself in a brothel.

yes good luck figuring that out

With TÁR (and maybe TÁR alone these days) I enjoy the bad takes as much as I don’t fully trust the good ones

Field is an awful director. His notion of editing is to cut, for example, from Lydia reading the increasingly desperate emails from the young conductor whose career she’s short-circuited (emails that she asks her assistant to delete) to a shot of her assaulting a punching bag at the gym; or from a scene where she trips and smashes into the pavement because she thinks she’s being pursued to a shot of her pounding dough in her kitchen.

What makes this awful?

Invited to give a master class at Juilliard, she asks a young Black man (Zethphan D. Smith-Gneist) about Bach and gets him to admit that he’s not interested in some old white guy who sired so many children he must have been a misogynist. Her hyper-educated cooled-out responses are so high-flown insulated that you can’t imagine he could possibly understand half of what she says; still, he laughs at her jokes but she makes him so nervous that he can’t control his restless leg. But he stands his ground about Bach. So she gets him to sit next to her at the piano and plays some, and she seems to be softening up his biases. But then she humiliates him in front of the class and he storms out, muttering, “Fucking bitch,” as he marches past her. The scene is mildly amusing but it isn’t drama; it’s more like an idea for a dramatic scene.

What?

OK, maybe "enjoy" isn't the right word here

"stare at, fascinatedly, as someone runs into a wall they made themselves, repeatedly"

todd field was finally (indirectly) asked about heather from the blair witch project's screams .......... pic.twitter.com/nQQTosaxoo

— troy (@joker_misato) April 18, 2023

Wait, what?!

If the Muppets were still doing a weekly variety show we 100% would have had a Miss Piggy parody of TÁR call PÍG where she karate kicks the conductor

— Ben Crew (@BenjaminCrew1) June 8, 2023

finally saw this - top tier comical ending for a ‘serious oscar movie’

Todd Field did his Daniel Plainview movie. How you feel? Results may vary!

There is no right reaction to this movie, it contains multitudes. As funny as you want, as serious as you want.

PS I’m in Berlin this past week and this movie keeps popping onto my head. I even went to the Philharmonic twice!

This movie was very funny in parts. I think it's hard to believe Olga didn't know how Tar messed her face up, which makes all the scenes afterwards with the two of them in vry funny. Tar telling the kid "she was going to get them" or whatever. Lots of great laughs in this

who'll bear the pall?

i'll-- we'll bear the pall.

furiously hitting the punching bag to the rhythm of eine kleine nachtmusik

I can't help but wonder if, during his six years spent learning how to mimic Bernstein conducting one single snippet of music, Bradley Cooper happened to catch Cate Blanchett besting him while not even breaking a sweat

Yeah she was very convincing. Cooper was not conducting, he was swatting at flying elves.

Would watch Blanchett as Bernstein.

Really, I'm Right Here

he was swatting at flying elves

I appreciate this deep cut.