Eastwood’s lifelong love affair with jazz found its most powerful expression in this stunning biopic on the legendary bebop musician Charlie Parker. Developed from a screenplay based on the memoirs of Parker’s widow, Chan, Bird focuses on the final chapter in the musician’s too-brief life, beginning with his bout with suicide and time-shifting through flashbacks to illuminate both the nature of his artistic genius and his singularly unremorseful lifestyle. For the role of Parker, Eastwood cast the young actor Forest Whitaker, who immersed himself in the character and earned the Best Actor prize at Cannes. Whitaker’s musical training helped him to mime brilliantly Parker’s performance style, while Eastwood oversaw the assembly of a meticulously remastered mix of Parker recordings, complemented by recreations by the jazz veteran Charles McPherson. The resulting film is not only one of the finest portraits yet made on the subject of jazz but Eastwood’s most personal and poignant work.