Maestro ★★★½

IS there anything Bradley Cooper can’t do?

Let me see…he can act, write, direct, produce, play guitar, play piano, conduct an orchestra, speak fluent French, perform open heart surgery.

Maybe not the last one; but his second film as director, Maestro, confirms he is going to be around cinema for some time to come.

Following the success of 2018’s remake of A Star is Born, Cooper has stayed with music as the backdrop for his second feature.

This time he has turned to biography – of the legendary conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein, focusing on his professional career and private life.

Cooper plays Bernstein while the wonderful Carey Mulligan plays his long-time partner and actress Felicia Montealegre.

Like many artists Bernstein was a complicated and driven genius, a workaholic and perfectionist who created some of the greatest music American has known.

This personality and his fluid sexuality also loomed large in his relationship with Montealegre which was constantly tested but survived until the very end.

Cooper shoots his film in three aspect ratios, mirroring the predominant cinema style of three different periods of time.

While the film-making is interesting throughout, Cooper chooses to concentrate a little too much on Bernstein’s personal life and relationships.

There is an amazing extended sequence two-thirds into the film of Bernstein in full flight as a conductor who seems to encapsulate the man.

A little more of Bernstein’s talent would have made the film even better.