Tár

A fairly substantial disappointment, Tár follows respected composer/conductor Lydia Tár (Cate Blanchett) as her personal and professional lives are thrown into turmoil after an accusation from a former student. Filmmaker Todd Field delivers an exceedingly (and often excessively) deliberate drama that’s rarely, if ever, as compelling and engrossing as one might’ve anticipated, which is a shame, ultimately, given that the movie boasts (and benefits from) a periodically breathtaking visual sensibility and Blanchett’s thoroughly spellbinding and absorbing performance – with, in terms of the latter, the actress turning in completely lived-in and convincing work that elevates the proceedings on a continuous basis. And although the picture’s been suffused with a handful of admittedly engaging sequences, including a terrific scene wherein Tár confronts an obnoxiously progressive student, Tár suffers from a meandering midsection that contains distressingly little in the way of context or forward momentum – thus ensuring, as a result, that there’s almost nothing here to wholeheartedly get invested in or excited about. (The arms-length atmosphere is, in addition, compounded by dialogue that’s generally rendered unintelligible by the heavily-accented actors’ penchant for mumbling and whispering.) By the time the intriguing yet underwhelming climactic stretch rolls around, Tár has cemented its place as a disastrously overlong misfire that is, for the most part, unable to make the impact for which Field is consistently striving (and the film is certainly a far cry from Field’s first two films, the superlative In the Bedroom and Little Children).

** out of ****