“Musicians often point to The Piece, that moment in their journey when something clicks for the first time, when a connection and a sacrifice and a transcendence occurs, beyond logic, beyond words, a synthesis of emotion and physicality but somehow existing beyond it. For me, it’s the “Adagietto.” When I performed it 20 years ago, it took a patience and presence, so much control and restraint and softness and movement that I had not known I had the capability to communicate through sound. It took everything I had from me, and afterward I leaned against my bass and cried. I can only imagine what it must have felt like for Blanchett to conduct it, to have the camera fixed upon Lydia as she stood in stillness as the air still buzzed. I was emotionally moved to hear the end of the “Adagietto”in the film, to melt into the double basses surrendering from the G to the F and the slow decrescendo into silence. And I thought, “Who would want to rush through love?”
I’m going to ramble about the Juilliard Bach scene, because I think it’s a hugely misunderstood scene.
Tagging for Tár spoilers bc the very end of this makes reference to the end of the film (it’ll be under a cut, but warning here too bc if your dashboard automatically shortens posts, by expanding the post you will see the cut expanded too).
Also Max self identifies in the film as ‘pangender’ but doesn’t clarify pronouns, so I’m going to try my best to pretty much avoid using any for this character.
The basic point of this scene is that neither side of the argument actually won. From comments I’ve been reading around, I think people are assuming Tár is meant to have won, and that her comments stem from the POV of Todd Field and are meant to push some Out of Touch Old Person ‘agenda,’ but I really doubt that’s what’s going on.
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First of all, if you’re going to walk into Juilliard and say you don’t like Bach, I don’t know what you even expect tbh. But, also, any teacher worth a damn should expect pushback. Max’s POV is completely normal for a young person, especially in 2022/3, and kudos for actually saying it out loud. And Tár’s POV is pretty much what any instructor would respond as well. She’s not softening any blows, that’s for sure, but she’s not necessarily being any crueler than most instructors I’ve ever had. It’s up to the individual to decide, but the main point is that you can’t go to a music school and forever avoid one of the most famous musicians to ever exist - you just can’t. You can’t avoid most things in life that are upsetting to you. Max walking out kind of proves what that thinking can do to you - we don’t know what happens to this character any further, but would you be willing to blow up an entire chance at Juilliard because you can’t handle Bach (due to his personal life)?
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Tár went too far in her point and made it too personal, especially as a white person speaking to a person of color. She wasn’t considering how Max probably knows a bit more about being judged by a lot of outward things than she does (and this is where being white & ‘x oppressed identity’ [woman / lesbian in Tár’s case] makes people who still retain a huge level of privilege [whiteness and social position with Tár] mistakenly believe they’re incapable of harm bc they’re also oppressed somehow - BIG HINT FOR UNDERSTANDING THIS FILM RIGHT HERE). But this scene is pretty pivotal to the point of the whole film. It’s not to say either side was right or wrong, it’s to showcase how Tár moves around other people, what her personal POV is, how she teaches.
She references Emily Dickson (‘A soul selects her own society’) and Freud (‘the narcissism of small differences’), she says things like ‘ultrasonic epistemic dissident’ to show off her vocabulary (something she intentionally does later on even worse). She’s very, very good at using intellect to pick away at people and make them feel inferior, as well as pushing physical boundaries (standing over Max initially with her leg raised and a hand in her pocket, pretending to punch Max’s face ‘playfully,’ finally actually grabbing Max’s leg that won’t stop shaking).
In the screenplay, it’s interesting that this is written too: Tár leaves stage, up the aisle, into the rake with the other fellows, leaving Max alone on the piano bench. Twenty vs one. Another intentional move - if you’ll notice, she’s very often positioning herself above Max in this conversation. The only time they share a seat is at the piano and briefly in the rake, when she’s attempting to still persuade the student to see her side of it, but Max still rejects Bach, so she moves on & Gets Worse.
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Spoiler for the end of the film under the cut (alongside my favorite quote from this scene).
Cate Blanchett with her performance in Tár (2022) gave the perfect portrayal of a sexy, insufferable lesbian with a giant ego and a big superiority complex and she deserves to win an Oscar for it:
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