Throughout the film, we see fragments of a journey in which a newly bearded Henry travels alone to the Alps looking forlorn safe to say, then, that whatever relationship they have ends badly. She becomes part of his life, though the idea of romance is held at bay. “There’s never been anything like it,” he purrs this claim, along with the assertion that the septuagenarian has a huge teenage fan base, is fairly hard to reconcile with the current realities of the classical-music marketplace.īut Henry keeps at it, especially when he realizes having Helen in the audience soothes his fears. An upcoming London concert will be live-streamed online and seen by the world. He thinks this is the reason people come out to see music performed live: “It’s the looming disaster that makes it special.” (In a lifetime of concertgoing, I’ve never once seen an audience be anything but encouraging or respectfully silent in such a moment.) He’s inclined not to go on with this comeback tour, but his manager Paul (Giancarlo Esposito) finesses and pleads with him. Henry is convinced he’s prone to sudden memory failures that he’ll freeze up onstage. Soon the two are meeting all over town, building a rapport for the story. But after another presumptuous episode, in which Helen takes charge of an impromptu performance for a handful of spectators, he reconsiders. She asks if she can write a profile of him, and he firmly rejects the idea. Helen later speaks to Henry alone, informing him that 15 years ago, he gave her advice that spared her an unsuccessful music career of her own. He’s questioned about this by a gaggle of reporters at a post-show press meetup for some reason, Helen, a stranger, leaps in to answer a question on Henry’s behalf. He hasn’t performed in years when we see this first concert after his wife’s death, he became a recluse. Henry’s exertion isn’t just musical passion, though. But its insights into artistry are more grandiose than meaningful. This story of the muse-like journalist ( Katie Holmes) who eases the performer’s anxieties will play well to some older viewers who are content with lovely scenery, pretty music and a star whose presence is welcome even when he’s stooping to play Poop in a terrible animated film about emoji. Sadly, the script for this debut feature, written by Louis Godbout, is less persuasive: No single event is fatally implausible, perhaps, but taken together it doesn’t ring true. Patrick Stewart makes a predictably perfect concert pianist in Claude Lalonde’s Coda: Stylish in a mildly attention-getting way, attentive to the world beyond his keyboard, able to tell convincing anecdotes about centuries-old composers.
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