There’s always one.
Every year, I watch all ten nominees for the Best Picture Oscar, which means that every year, I have to spend a whole evening watching somebody impersonate a musician. Maestro, this year, was my dutiful sacrifice to the Academy.
As with Bohemian Rhapsody and Elvis, I can only spend my review questioning why this movie was made. Musicians, after all, hardly need films: their work speaks so loudly for itself, and we can access it any time we want. Of what importance, really, are their private lives? This is an especially pressing quandary for this picture, since Leonard Bernstein wasn’t a wild man like Freddy Mercury or Elvis, both of whom, as characters, at least promise a spectacle (even in their faded, Oscar-tailored iterations). Rather, he was a focused composer who mixed in high society and partook in affairs. The movie, therefore, has nothing to depict. Its runtime consists of light, uninteresting banter—as if, instead of aiming to portray older times, it means to copy older cinematic aesthetics: in particular the penchant for sniggering, martini-sipping remarks, which don’t pack a tremendous punch these days.
Bradley Cooper wears a prosthetic nose for this role. He has to, because he doesn’t look a lot like Leonard Bernstein. Truth be told, he doesn’t sound a lot like him, either. It was a stroke of good fortune for his casting prospects, however, that the director, co-writer, and co-producer of this movie were all… Bradley Cooper.
(Said dryly between martini sips): The audition must have been a breeze.
–Jim Andersen