They've played as a tight quartet for twenty-five years but now the lauded Walken, Hoffman, Keener and Ivanir are fast approaching a crossroads. Walken has been diagnosed with Parkinson's, which would explain why his timing was off at a recent rehearsal, and the group have to make a decision: go on with another cellist, which will change the way they play, or disband. Meanwhile, Hoffman, egged on by the attractive dancer he jogs with, wants to move from second violin to first, something his wife, Keener, is against. Their daughter (Imogen Poots) is Ivanir's student and the straight and po-faced first violinist's staid life is about to get an injection of energy.
Films about classical musicians are usually meditative affairs and there's a lot of reflection going on here as it tackles that awkward question - what have I done with my life now that it's half over? But this is no typical mid-life crisis drama. Heads are turned by attractive women and long kept secrets are finally voiced but no one buys a Corvette. A Late Quartet is of subtler things. Hoffman's second violin in quartet/second violin in life analogy and the accepting your role in the group/accepting your lot in life comparisons are made gently. The piece they're trying to perfect is Beethoven's Op 131 which is notoriously difficult and there's an importance to rely on and trust each other. Just like we have to in … okay, maybe it's not so subtle.
Walken aside, who is granted the loveliest of scenes when he has to concede his illness is hampering the quartet's performance mid recital, it's the disintegration of the Keener/Hoffman marriage that really holds attention. Nothing is thrown against a wall - there is just an acceptance that they have been sliding towards a break up for years. Where the film falls down is with the Ivanir/Poots burgeoning relationship. Never too believable - he's just a tad miserable - this subplot produces a scene that is parachuted in from a Katherine Heigl movie: Ivanir is forced to hide on Poots's balcony when Keener stops by.
Despite working to hit home emotionally, A Late Quartet (that lovely Walken scene aside) doesn't have the punch it needs.