A Late Quartet

Directed by Yaron Zilberman

R

***

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One of the great pleasures of this “masterful” film about a famous string quartet comes from seeing “familiar and gifted actors forming an ensemble of their own,” said Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times. Christopher Walken is the biggest revelation. His unusual timing and mannerisms are often employed for caricature, but his performance here reminds us that “he can be a deep and subtle actor.” When his character, a cellist and the group’s leader, learns that he’s in the early stages of Parkinson’s disease, the quartet’s future hangs in the balance. Catherine Keener and Philip Seymour Hoffman, playing long-married quartet members, are “flawless together, giving us an emotional CT scan of a troubled couple,” said Colin Covert in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. The strain intensifies when Hoffman’s violinist suggests that he be shifted to the lead chair, occupied by his wife’s former lover (a commanding Mark Ivanir). This same rival turns out to be now sleeping with the couple’s daughter—a development that offers a hint of the melodrama these actors have to sell, said David Edelstein in New York magazine. Still, it’s a fine movie: Crank up the Beethoven and “let’s have a little laugh and a cry.”