A Late Quartet
Directed by Yaron Zilberman
This is the story of a classical string quartet in crisis due to the illness and departure of its cellist and senior member, Peter Mitchell (Christopher Walken). It is a powerful, moving story, but I doubt that it will have a wide audience. The audience for this film is devotees of classical music, students in music conservatories, and fusty old conservatives with very conventional ideas about music, sex, and relationships.
It is a film for mature audiences. When I say “mature audience” I don’t mean that it has sexual content and is therefore not suitable for young people. On the contrary, I think sexual content is especially appropriate for young people because they are most curious and preoccupied with sexual feelings and issues, and should therefore be taking every opportunity to learn about it in any way they can. “Mature audience,” for me, means an audience that has lived long enough to grasp the complexities and layers of personal relationships that have continued over a long period of time. “Mature” means having perspective, being able to see the context in which passions and longings are played out, understanding the limitations and trade-offs, and ambivalences that are inevitable in human relations. Being able to see that things change and evolve, and what is true today, may not be true tomorrow, and what was true yesterday may no longer be true today however much we might wish it to be. It means being able to face up to what we are as people defined by what we have done or not done, rather than by what we have wished or strived for. Young people can grasp these things intellectually, but they don’t know, and can’t know, what it feels like and looks like to a much older person. That is just the nature of being younger or older. That is the meaning of “maturity.” So when I say that this film is for a mature audience, this is what I am talking about. The issues are mature and the themes are mature. I don’t mean to say that young people should not see it. They absolutely should, because it will help them understand older people. But the issues of the film are not their issues, with the exception of the sexual affairs between the younger girls and the older men, which the film treats very badly, trivializing them, and dismissing them in a rather callous, nonsensical fashion.
I like the subject matter, and the film is very well made, but I have a number of problems with the script. The female characters are not well drawn, and I think, given short shrift. The most promising character in the whole film, Alexandra (Imogen Poots), is turned into a confused, spineless, simpering jellyfish. Juliette, (Catherine Keener) the violist and wife of the second violinist, Robert (Philip Seymour Hoffman), and the mother of Alexandra, is not fleshed out at all. She becomes a very conventional and inadequate housewife and mother whose only asset seems to be her role as violist in the quartet. She fails as a wife and she fails as a mother, and is rather problematic throughout the saga. She seems to want to keep everything the way it has been, but she is not very effective in anything she attempts and we do not see who she is in any depth.
Although sex plays a major role in the story line, the film upholds very conventional middle class attitudes toward sex and relationships, which have nothing to offer but disappointment, defeat, and failure, and you’re supposed to just live with that. Robert, the second violinist, whose dissatisfaction with his role in the quartet and his marriage is one of the dynamic forces in the film, ends up being defeated in all his attempts to shake things up and alter his position vis-a-vis the others in the group. He starts an affair with a young flamenco dancer (Liraz Charhi) that gets nipped in the bud by his wife after their first night together, and the very appealing girl is rudely dismissed. He should have fought harder for her, but he was a total wimp and caved in to his wife with hardly a protest. The incident did prompt them to hash out some of the issues in their marriage, which are of long standing, as such things usually are, but they don’t really get anywhere. Juliette takes the typical attitude of the American middle class woman and is prepared to trash the whole marriage because her husband fucked a young dancer one time. It’s so idiotic. I’ve seen people blow up twenty year marriages, sell houses, move long distances, fight bitterly over kids and money, all on account of a little bit of outside fucking. Americans are crazy. So while the film panders to conventional attitudes, it fails to offer anything constructive or insightful. It doesn’t raise any questions. It just proffers pat answers that it takes for granted.
Similarly with the affair between Daniel (Mark Ivanir), the first violinist, and Alexandra, the daughter of Robert and Juliette. Daniel and Alexandra have probably known each other since she was born. The first question you have to ask yourself is why this affair even happened? As the film presents it — which I don’t quite believe — Robert recommends Alexandra to Daniel for violin lessons. Daniel treats her like a child and belittles her. He tells her she is not ready to tackle Beethoven’s Opus 131. I suspect that is something music students often hear from their teachers, that certain pieces are beyond their understanding and they should wait until they are older or more mature before they tackle them. What a lot of quatch! So what if you make mistakes? So what if you don’t understand it fully? Go ahead and plunge into it, if you feel a strong urge beckoning you! Defy them! I mean it! Of course you’ll play it better when you’re fifty. You better hope you will. But you have to start where you are, when you feel the desire and enthusiasm to tackle the challenging new project. If you wait for a bunch of old people to bless you and tell you you’re ready, you’ll never do anything. She should have ripped the music book in half and stormed out. Instead she seduces him. She is the aggressor and the initiator of the affair. She seemed to be seeking his approval, and she wasn’t getting it through her violin playing, so she had another way of getting it that she knew would work for sure. OK, so once you get him, what do you do with him? Here the film reaches its low point of nonsense. The affair is quickly discovered by the others in the group, in particular, by her parents, and they go into apoplexy. Why? Why is it so objectionable to them? The film treats their disapproval as something self evident and unproblematic. But the affair is quite natural and almost predictable. Robert, in the most dramatic moment of the film –, and very much out of character for a string quartet — punches Daniel in the face and knocks him off his chair during rehearsal — a punch that will probably be applauded by every second violinist around the world. But it is total nonsense. Robert becomes a ridiculous figure, flailing about violently, out of control, completely helpless and totally ineffective. Alexandra stands up very admirably to her mother, but then turns around and inexplicably dismisses Daniel and ends the affair that she just started, although Daniel is firm in his resolve to continue with it in the face of all the opposition — the only one in the film with any real character. But this makes Alexandra look like a weak, confused, immature idiot. This is why I think this film treats the women with pronounced hostility. All of the sexual affairs — which are initiated by the young women — are quickly and definitively crushed, but for no good reason. The film is simply hostile to sexual relationships that don’t fit into the mold of conventional middle class marriage. This gives the film an atmosphere of mundane conservatism. It is very ordinary. Nothing like Beethoven.
I should probably say something about the Beethoven Quartet Opus 131 in C# minor that plays a thematic role in the film. The choice of this particular quartet as a centerweight to this film is very appropriate because of the broad emotional range found throughout the quartet from anguish, contention, and turmoil, to relaxed, airy, lighthearted fun, as well as some enigmatic aspects that are difficult to penetrate. This quartet is rather unusual. It is in seven movements instead of the usual four, and Beethoven wanted them played without the usual pauses between the movements. So it makes for a rather long, continuous piece that is demanding for both performers and audience. Beethoven expected people to have long attention spans. He should have lived in America for a while. The piece is somber and anguished. The first movement is painful. It is a fugue that stabs at your heart. The second and fifth movements are much more upbeat, especially the fifth movement, which is essentially a scherzo. It is somewhat repetitious, but vigorous and lively. The second movement is bright and almost lilting. The third and sixth movements are very short and seem to serve as introductions to the longer, more substantial movements that follow. The sixth movement is a somber, mournful dirge that segues into the vigorous final movement. The fourth movement is quite long, nearly fifteen minutes. I found it difficult to relate to. I couldn’t seem to get a fix on it, emotionally. There seems to be a longing that is not well defined. The anguish is there, but it is subdued, almost below the surface, threatening to break through in points but never quite taking over. Some of the good cheer fleetingly appears and then vanishes just as suddenly. I don’t get it, and I think it is the heart of the quartet. It seems to be the center of gravity of the whole piece. The last movement is rough, contentious, and full of struggle and drama. This quartet is a mature piece that challenges both the listener and the performer. It is very fitting to the issues besetting this group of people.
The film has a lot to say about music and performance that will be of keen interest to musicians. I found it to be very touching and moving. It could have been a great movie if it had not taken such a conventional, mediocre attitude toward the story line. At the end of the film the cellist is replaced by a new member, who has worked with the group before, and is judged to be a good fit that will maintain the established character of the group. So everything stays the way it was. The quartet continues on playing the same music with the same character and style. The sexual affairs with the young girls are ended. The marriage seems to be limping along as it had before. Everything ends up pretty close to the way it was at the beginning. Only the cellist is replaced. And that is supposed to be a happy, harmonious ending. What a crock! It makes a mockery of the whole film. What was all the contention and struggle about if we end up with essentially the same quartet, playing in the same style, in the same personal relationships? Does the mere presence of a stable cellist subdue all the conflict and dissatisfaction that was afflicting this group from long before this movie started? This film should be titled “The Triumph of Conservatism and Conventionality in Classical Music and in Life.”
This quartet should have broken up like the Beatles. I thought about that as I was watching it. The married couple should have separated or divorced. The daughter should have moved in with the first violinist. The second violinist should have left, founded his own quartet and been very successful, and the flamenco dancer should have gotten pregnant with the second violinist’s child. Now that would have been a good movie.
