Tar ★★★★

CATE Blanchett is a lock-in for this year’s Best Actress Oscar.

Her performance in Todd Field’s Tar is a note-perfect portrayal of a flawed genius that grabs your attention from the first frame and holds it until the last.

Like her character’s hold over the people around her, Blanchett has the audience in the palm of her hand; she controls the timing and nature of our reactions in the same way her character conducts the musicians in her orchestra.

Blanchett is aided by writer/director Todd Field’s wonderful script that builds and destroys Lydia Tár in our hearts and minds over the course of the film.

A masterful opening 15 minutes shows us almost everything we need to know about Lydia with a meticulously built biography that makes the audience unsure whether Blanchett is actually playing a real person. She isn’t, bit you would be forgiven for thinking so.

Tar is only the third feature film from Field who previously gave us strong psychological dramas with In the Bedroom (2001) and Little Children (2006). The pacing and camera technique is constantly inventive and the music score is obviously a key part of the film’s power.

But it’s Blanchett who dominates almost every scene in delivering her career-defining performance.

Watched at the cinema.