Cate Blanchett's greatest performance - Tar

Let me be honest; I would give Cate Blanchett the Oscar for Best Ac­t­ress, sight unseen. First look at her career, then focus on her new film, before it opens in Aust­ral­ian cinemas.

Cate (b1969) graduated from Melbour­ne's Nation­al Instit­ute of Drama­tic Art in 1992, a great car­eer decision from the start. Then she mo­­ved to accept rol­es in Sydney Theatre Co's produc­t­ions of Top Girls, Kafka Dances and Oleanna. Her first tv role was in the ABC's drama Heart­land (1994). She was a suc­­c­essful Op­h­elia in Bel­v­oir Street Theatre Co's pro­d­uction of Ham­let, plus The Tempest and The Blind Giant is Dancing. TV roles foll­owed, but I was much more famil­iar with her feature film,  Paradise Road (1997).  

Queen Elizabeth I

IMD

Cate met Andrew Upton in 1997 on a film set, then they married and left for Britain to play the starring role in Elizabeth (1998), win­ning a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Drama. Later she had star­ring roles in Bandits (2001), Shipping News (2001), Charlotte Grey (2001) and the Lord Of The Rings trilogy.

I don’t remember her role as Katharine Hepburn in Martin Scors­e­se's film The Aviator (2004), winning a Best Supporting Act­ress Ac­ad­­emy Award. But I remember her Academy Award nomin­ation as Best Support­ing Actress for the naughty teacher in Notes on a Scandal (2006).

The biggest change came when the two of them became artistic direct­ors of the Sydney Theatre Co in 2008, to spend more family-time on Sydney’s beaches. Then Woody Allen offered her the title role in Bl­ue Jas­mine (2013), winning the Academy Award as Best Actress!! This largely ended her directorship of the Sydney Theatre Co.

Cate Blanchett’s career continued well, but let’s leap to her best role, soon to be released in Australia! David Stratton in the Aust­r­a­l­ian (21/1/2023) wrote that Todd Field’s huge­ly am­bitious, im­press­ive drama Tar (2022) is a portrait of a great art­ist: orchestra con­ductor Lydia Tar. It might be the perf­orm­ance of Blanch­ett’s career, one that won the Best Actress prize in Venice and a Golden Globe Aw­ard. But the film is more than a great perform­ance: it’s a film about cancel culture, political correctness and abuse of power.

Start with a lengthy interview in a New York theatre in which New Yorker journalist Adam Gopnik chats with Tar before a lar­ge, en­th­usiastic audience. Tar is art­ic­ulate, witty and supremely confid­ent and this scene effectively illustrates the conductor’s back story.

She was mentored by the revered Leonard Bernstein, has cond­uct­ed Bos­­ton’s Symphony Orchestra and New York’s Philharmonic Orchestra, and has been conductor of the Berlin Phil­harmonic. She has learnt German (as did Blanchett) and lives in a beautiful Berlin apartment with her wife, Sharon/Nina Hoss, and their adopted Middle Eastern daughter, Petra/Mila Bogajevic. She also keeps a second apartment which she uses so that she can work in peace, and for other reasons!

Conducting the orchestra in Tar

WSWS

 

In the interview Tar, who has composed music for the movies, reveals that she’s a artist who has won Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony awards. She also reveals that she’s writing a book and she def­ines the most important elem­ent of music as time. She asserts that to conduct Mah­ler’s Symphony #5, which she is about to do in Berlin, it’s essent­ial to know all about the relationship between the com­p­oser and his wife. Thus Tar is an obsessive con­t­rol freak!

Then Tar is teaching students at the pr­estigious Juilliard School of Music where she humiliates a young male st­udent who refuses to play Bach because he thinks the composer was a misogynist. Tar is not ha­v­­­ing any of this cancel culture: The arch­it­ect of your soul app­ears to be soc­ial media, she tells the student in a withering put-down that will have ramifications later.

Each person involved in Tar’s life plays an important role in the drama: her PA Francesca/Noemie Merlant, capable and ambitious young woman; Elliott/Mark Strong, invest­ment banker with whom she has established the Acccordian Cond­ucting Fellowship, supporting young wom­en conductors; Seb­astian/Allan Cor­d­uner, eld­erly assistant cond­uc­t­or who crit­ic­ised one of Tar’s decisions; and Olga/Sophie Kauer, the new cellist, a deceptively naïve young Russian woman. Real mus­icians are featured as memb­ers of the orchestra.

Rarely in the cinema has there been such a detailed, comprehens­ive portrait of an artist. The film celebrates Tar for her tireless en­th­usiasm for her work and for how she navigates the inevitable politics behind a famous orchestra. And it criticises her for her ruthlessness and cunning.

Lydia Tar is brilliant, and also arrogant, power-hungry and malic­ious. And she abuses her power, con­fident that she is too imp­ort­ant, too indispensable to face any con­sequences. She first shows her true colours when she confronts a little schoolgirl who bullied her daughter, yelling at the startled child in German!

One important character seen in the film is Krista, one of the as­piring conductors Tar has pledged to support. Like other young women who cross Tar’s path, Krista had a deeply distressing exp­erience with the celebrated conductor.

The world of classical music concerts might seem to be a very ref­in­ed one and there’s no doubt that the 2.5 hours film will be a chall­enge for some viewers. But it’s a challenge that will be well rew­ar­d­­ed, seeing the brilliant Blanchett and also for the universal in­sights that the film potently explores. Actually Tar is as much a sexual predator as a Harvey Weinstein and Blanchett is exceptional in the role, supported by a fine cast. It’s an intelligent, disturb­ing film about power, sex and art.