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88A Late Quartet does one of the most interesting things any film can do. It shows how skilled professionals work.
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50Yes, A Late Quartet is disappointing. But it's also pretty bad.
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88Walken was largely typecast in quirky roles as a result of playing the title character's brother in "Annie Hall," so it's something of a delightful irony that 35 years later, Walken finds his most rewarding role leading a terrific ensemble in what amounts to one of the best Woody Allen movies that Allen wasn't involved in making.
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75Grace notes abound in A Late Quartet, a small, shining gem of a movie that works its way into your heart with insinuating potency of music.
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75For those willing to enter this world and pay attention, A Late Quartet provides distinct and uncommon satisfactions.
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75The title refers not only to particular music by Beethoven but also to the fictional string quartet of Yaron Zilberman's fussily genteel, overplotted Manhattan tale in which interpersonal stresses build to a crescendo when one of the foursome becomes ill.
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70It would be shortsighted to dismiss this deeply felt, musically savvy film, set in a refined cultural precinct of Manhattan, as sudsy melodrama.
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63The performances are worth a look, especially since Christopher Walken so rarely gets to play a sane person.
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50A Late Quartet overplays its bass line and loses sight of the melody, making for a movie that is heavy-handed and sluggish. It remains earthbound when it should soar.
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67Zilberman's conceit is that these players, who mesh so beautifully in their music-making, are discordant in their personal lives. Those lives are constructed for maximum messiness, turning what might have been resonant drama into high-class soap opera.
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75The screenplay by Seth Grossman and Israeli-American director Yaron Zilberman is old-fashioned and melodramatic but stirring in its portrait of people struggling with individual egos to produce something nobler than themselves.
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70I was happy watching these actors, happy going behind the scenes of a sober classical music ensemble instead of another druggy rock group, happy hearing Beethoven for a couple of hours. The movie is haut-bourgeois to the bone, but so am I: Let's hear some chamber music and have a little laugh and a cry!
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50Watching A Late Quartet feels more like sitting through a Classical Music 101 lecture than entertainment.
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50The scenes of the musicians rehearsing or talking about music, with the actors playing parts of Opus 131 themselves (the longer stretches are played by the Brentano Quartet), are fascinating and moving for anyone who loves this music; the rest of the movie is conventional.
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60The sort of movie you should go see with someone you love. You should also hold their hand during the movie. And be thankful that that hand is there.
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60The four leads more often than not transcend the material's calculated moroseness; Ivanir is especially good as a man whose perfectionist facade masks a soul in perpetual turmoil.
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83Despite too stately a pace at times, and some fairly predictable plot resolutions, the film succeeds thanks to empathetic performances (from Walken and especially Hoffman) and an evident affection for the music and musicians it depicts.
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70Centered around four outstanding performances, Yaron Zilberman's fiction-feature debut feels like the work of a filmmaker who knows and appreciates the art form under scrutiny, laying a credible foundation for a story that lays bare the often melodramatic passions of the artistic soul.
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60Zilberman's minimalistic approach fits the idea of the film better than it fits the actual film. It leaves this melancholy mood piece with some beautiful moments, but unlike Beethoven's work, A Late Quartet ultimately feels unfinished.
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83How many surprises and peaks can Walken possibly have left, after so many movies and memorable roles? Well, there's this one.
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83Leave it to Walken to upstage Beethoven.
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63Playing the cello is such a pleasant change of pace that he (Walken) eventually grows on you, scene by scene, proving for the first time since his role as Leonardo DiCaprio's troubled father 10 years ago in "Catch Me If You Can," that he really can act. He - along with the rest of the elegant cast - keeps A Late Quartet in tune when it threatens to go flat.
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70A Late Quartet serves as an acting showcase, particularly for Walken and Hoffman, and makes for an interesting study in artistic ego.
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60Measured performances from the seasoned cast balance out a script that errs towards the melodramatic. Hours sweating over those instruments pay dividends too.
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70It's rare these days to see an old-fashioned, elegant chamber-piece movie about life and art - let alone one with Christopher Walken as, of all things, a steadying influence.
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83Yaron Zilberman's first feature has a solid structure, but as with a piece of music, the way it's played makes all the difference. His principal actors aren't great at faking their instrumental prowess, but they're perfectly in tune with each other, playing artists who've postponed life's decisions in the name of pursuing their craft.
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50The trio (Hoffman/Keener/Walken) give top shelf performances as we've always come to expect from them in A Late Quartet. But it's just too bad that they're in service of Yaron Zilberman's film, which takes the unique focus of a string quartet in Manhattan, and puts it in the middle of a standard and unsatisfying soap opera, that spins off into one subplot too many.
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80The leads make sweet music in an affecting four-piece that, if not note perfect, plays well to their individual strengths. A marked improvement overall on this year’s other Quartet.
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Nov 1, 201270It's something of a relief that little is actually resolved in A Late Quartet; Zilberman is at his best when leaving narrative threads hanging rather than trying to tie them together.
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Oct 31, 201250A muted soap opera masquerading as erudite ensemble piece, Yaron Zilberman's A Late Quartet jettisons character plausibility in favor of pop psychology and leaden instrument analogies.
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Sep 11, 201260The film mines both the relationship issues and the Upper East Side neighborhoods of Woody Allen's best work, but could use an added dose of the Woodster's jokes to spruce up a self-serious scenario that hits the right notes about half the time.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 7 out of 7
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Mixed: 0 out of 7
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As the film opens and the four members of the renown, Manhattan based Fugue string-quartet grace their humble audience and stage, they slowly bow