MAESTRO (2023)

It is somewhat disconcerting (but no less revealing) when one’s initial, primal reaction upon seeing a film is “boy, so and so sure looks desperate for an Oscar”. I’ve just had that experience after viewing Maestro, directed by and starring Bradley Cooper.

The subject of this cinematic biography is Leonard Bernstein, the acclaimed conductor and composer responsible for such luminous scores heard in Kazan’s On the Waterfront (1954) and – more famously – both the theatrical and cinematic performances of West Side Story. In terms of presentation, Maestro displays an admirable expansion of elegance and ambition for Cooper in his twin duties as a filmmaker (this is his second directorial feature after 2018’s remake of A Star is Born) and actor. In the former he exudes the sort of one-in-a-million confidence that even esteemed veterans sometimes lack, whilst in the latter he provides an excellent imitation. Carey Mulligan is charming and poised as Felicia, Bernstein’s love, but make no mistake: Cooper is mesmeric here. Though Cooper bursts with charisma and verve, it is lamentable that the picture never penetrates to the heart of the man or the stirring, soaring compositions with which he so doggedly invested himself in. The result is a portrait (scrapbook would be a more apt description) that garrulous, visually striking and silky, yet hollow and without complexities which, in a year that has seen the release of Tár (2022), can only be deemed a disappointment.

Still, while it is awards-baity tosh of the highest calibre, Maestro is pleasurable on the senses and should prove an interesting watch for cinephiles and musos with a penchant for the romantic.