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The Plot of Tár: Power, Abuse, Breakdown, and Fall

Tár (Todd Field, 2022) is a movie about Lydia Tár (Cate Blanchett), a famous composer-conductor and the first female chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic. In an interview at the New Yorker Festival, she promotes several new projects, including her upcoming live recording of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony. Lydia has lunch with Eliot Kaplan, a conductor who manages a fellowship program she founded for aspiring women conductors, and talks about replacing her assistant conductor, Sebastian, presumably with Francesca, her personal assistant. Later, while Lydia is teaching at the Juilliard School, she ridicules Max, a student, for lacking interest in conducting the classical masters due to identity politics. She encourages students to look past superficial differences to find the music underneath. Max subsequently storms out.

Before returning to Berlin, Lydia receives Vita Sackville-West’s novel Challenge from Krista Taylor, a former fellowship program member. Dream sequences and email interactions suggest Lydia had groomed Krista into entering a sexually transactional relationship, which later falls apart. Lydia blacklists Krista, ruining her chances at a conducting career.

Before a blind audition for a new orchestra cellist, Lydia sees one hopeful candidate, a Russian woman named Olga, in the bathroom. Attracted to Olga, Lydia offers her favors, such as changing her scorecard to ensure a spot in the orchestra and a soloist position in the companion piece to Mahler’s Fifth. As Francesca and Sharon (Tár’s wife and concertmaster) recognize Lydia’s attraction to Olga, their respective relationships are strained. There is an interesting detail about Olga that is regularly missed by critics: Olga is the only woman in the movie not under pressure or terrorized by Lydia. She is a staunch Leftist, and tells Lydia that she regularly participated in Leftist demonstrations in Berlin, mentioning Clara Zetkin (a big name in German Social Democracy), who proposed to establish March 8 as a day of women’s rights.

Lydia informs Sebastian of his imminent replacement. Incensed, he indicates the orchestra is aware of her favoritism, and suggests she is guilty of abusive behavior towards young women. Sebastian speculates Francesca will be his replacement, and implies that this is in exchange for sexual favors. Unnerved by the accusations, Lydia decides to replace Sebastian with a different candidate.

Krista dies by suicide, leaving a note with serious allegations against Lydia. Lydia instructs Francesca to delete any emails from or about her. Lydia retains a lawyer, as Krista’s parents plan to sue her.

She is haunted by screaming women in the distance, nightmares, chronic pain, an increasing sensitivity to sound, and enigmatic scribbles resembling those Krista once made. Her only respites are Olga and her adopted daughter, Petra. One day, after practicing Olga’s solo, Lydia follows her home to an abandoned and dilapidated apartment complex. Scared by a dog, Lydia trips and injures herself. She lies to Sharon and her orchestra, claiming the injuries were from an assault. Without telling Lydia, Francesca resigns upon learning she will not be replacing Sebastian. An edited, out-of-context video of Lydia’s Juilliard class goes viral, and an article with accusations against her appears in the New York Post. Protesters meet Lydia as she returns to New York to promote her book and attend a deposition for Krista’s lawsuit. At the deposition, it is implied that Francesca has shared damning emails with the plaintiff. Lydia takes Olga along, but Olga abandons her. Back home, Sharon, furious with the allegations, but more so at Lydia’s lack of communication or seeking her counsel as her spouse, leaves with Petra. Lydia is removed as conductor. She sneaks into the live recording performance of Mahler’s Fifth and attacks her replacement, Eliot. Advised to lie low by her management agency, she returns to her lower-class childhood home on Staten Island, where her brother comes home and scolds her, telling her that her birth name is Linda Tarr. Sometime later, Lydia finds work conducting an orchestra in an unnamed Southeast Asian country. At a massage parlor/brothel where escorts are staged and framed like her orchestra, she picks her masseuse from a big glass bowl. One girl looks up into Lydia’s eyes, her bodily posture the same as Olga’s, and Lydia rushes outside to vomit. Lydia conducts her new orchestra in the score for the video game series Monster Hunter in front of an audience of cosplayers. “We have gone from Mahler’s Fifth to a PlayStation 2 game.” But she treats the orchestra with the same seriousness and passion as the big philharmonic orchestras of her previous career.

练习题

Which option best describes Lydia Tár’s early professional position and the conflicts introduced around it?

A. Lydia is an unknown student conductor who hopes to join the Berlin Philharmonic after being praised by Max at Juilliard.

B. Lydia is a famous composer-conductor and first female chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic; she promotes a live recording of Mahler’s Fifth, plans to replace Sebastian, and clashes with Max at Juilliard over identity politics and classical masters.

C. Lydia is a retired conductor who avoids public interviews and refuses to discuss Mahler, Sebastian, or the Juilliard School.

D. Lydia is a cellist auditioning blindly for Olga’s orchestra while Eliot Kaplan tries to blacklist her.

Krista Taylor is described as a former fellowship member whom Lydia allegedly groomed, later blacklisted, and whose suicide note contains serious allegations against Lydia; Lydia then tells Francesca to delete emails and retains a lawyer because Krista’s parents plan to sue.

Which statements about Olga, Sebastian, and Francesca are supported by the plot summary?

A. Lydia is attracted to Olga and offers her favors, including changing a scorecard and giving her a soloist position.

B. Olga is described as the only woman in the movie not under pressure or terrorized by Lydia.

C. Olga is described as politically indifferent and uninterested in demonstrations in Berlin.

D. Sebastian suggests the orchestra knows about Lydia’s favoritism and implies abusive behavior toward young women.

E. Sebastian speculates that Francesca’s possible advancement would be transactional, and Francesca later resigns after learning she will not replace him.

After Lydia follows Olga home, is frightened by a dog, trips, and injures herself, she lies to Sharon and the orchestra by claiming the injuries came from ___.

Which option correctly summarizes Lydia’s late-career downfall as described in the plot?

A. Lydia keeps her Berlin post, conducts Mahler’s Fifth successfully, and retires to Staten Island as Lydia Tár without controversy.

B. Lydia is removed as conductor, attacks Eliot at the Mahler’s Fifth performance, returns to her childhood home where her brother calls her Linda Tarr, and later conducts in Southeast Asia, including music from Monster Hunter.

C. Lydia is promoted after the scandal, replaces Eliot, and refuses to conduct any orchestra outside Europe.

D. Lydia leaves conducting entirely and becomes a lawyer for Krista’s parents.

Select all statements that connect Lydia’s public artistic authority with the early signs of abuse, favoritism, and ideological conflict.

A. Lydia’s status as the first female chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic gives her major institutional authority.

B. Her New Yorker Festival appearance includes promotion of an upcoming live recording of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony.

C. Her discussion of replacing Sebastian and her later treatment of Olga both show that personnel decisions are entangled with personal favoritism.

D. At Juilliard, Lydia argues that students should focus only on identity labels and reject classical music completely.

E. Sebastian’s accusations frame Lydia’s behavior as favoritism and possible abuse, while also implying Francesca’s advancement may be transactional.

Which sequence best captures how the Krista and Francesca plotlines intensify Lydia’s collapse?

A. Krista praises Lydia publicly, Francesca becomes Sebastian’s replacement, and the lawsuit disappears.

B. Krista dies by suicide after leaving allegations; Lydia tells Francesca to delete emails; Francesca later resigns and is implied to have shared damaging emails; scandal grows, Sharon leaves, Lydia is removed, and Lydia attacks Eliot.

C. Krista replaces Olga as cellist, Francesca defends Lydia in the press, and Sharon celebrates Lydia’s removal.

D. Francesca deletes all evidence, Krista’s parents withdraw their lawsuit, and Lydia peacefully conducts the Mahler recording.

The plot’s description of Olga contrasts with the prior idea of the Red Room’s controlled female killers: Olga is not described as mind-controlled or terrorized by Lydia, but as a Leftist who took part in Berlin demonstrations and mentioned Clara Zetkin; meanwhile, Lydia’s respites include Olga and Petra, and after her fall she still treats conducting seriously.

When Lydia returns to her lower-class childhood home on Staten Island, her brother scolds her and says her birth name is ___.

In 1–3 sentences, explain how Lydia Tár can be read as a parallax figure when her artistic greatness is considered alongside her abusive conduct and final fall.

Which interpretation best integrates Lydia Tár’s public role as a celebrated conductor with the prior concept of Tár as a parallax object?

A. Lydia’s artistic greatness and abusive conduct are unrelated traits, so the film asks viewers to ignore one while judging the other.

B. Lydia’s status as a famous composer-conductor and her acts of favoritism, blacklisting, and abuse form a parallax: a shift in perspective reveals that her sublime artistic authority and monstrosity are intimately connected.

C. Lydia’s fall occurs only because the public misunderstands classical music after the viral Juilliard video.

D. Lydia’s professional role matters only as background information and has no connection to the film’s ethical conflicts.

Which details from the plot support a parallax reading in which Lydia’s artistic seriousness cannot be cleanly separated from her power and abuse?

A. Lydia promotes a live recording of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony while her professional world is also shaped by favoritism and replacement politics.

B. Lydia changes her scorecard to help Olga gain an orchestra position and a soloist role connected to the Mahler program.

C. Lydia blacklists Krista after an allegedly sexually transactional relationship falls apart.

D. Lydia conducts the Monster Hunter score with the same seriousness and passion she brought to major philharmonic orchestras.

E. Olga mentions Clara Zetkin, which proves that Lydia’s conduct is unrelated to institutional power.

True or false: Lydia’s Juilliard claim that students should look past superficial identity differences to find the music underneath is uncomplicatedly confirmed by the plot, because the film shows her own professional choices as free from identity, desire, and power.

The prior concept of ___ helps explain why a small shift in how we view Lydia can make her appear both artistically sublime and morally monstrous.

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