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Bird

Screening on Film
Directed by Clint Eastwood.
With Forest Whitaker, Diane Venora, Michael Zelniker.
US, 1988, 35mm, color, 160 min.

Eastwood’s lifelong love affair with jazz found its most powerful expression in this stunning biopic of 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 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. Forest Whitaker, whose musical training helped him mime Parker’s performance style, won the award for best actor at Cannes, and Eastwood’s assemblage of a meticulously remastered mix of Parker recordings and recreations by Charles McPherson lends authenticity to the dramatic proceedings.

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