American Symphony Review

Plot: A moving portrait of musician Jon Batiste, who in 2022 found himself the most celebrated artist of the year with eleven Grammy nominations including Album of the Year. In the midst of that triumph, Jon embarks on his most ambitious challenge to date, composing an original symphony. This trajectory was upended, however, when his life partner — best-selling author Suleika Jaouad — learns that her long-dormant cancer has returned. 

Review: Few things are as subjective as art, whether film, music, literature or any other creative outlet. Fame is also fleeting, but when true artistry mixes with the zeitgeist, it can be powerful. Jon Batiste is an artist who has found success in many forms, personally and professionally. Best known as the band leader on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and for his Oscar-winning score for Pixar’s Soul, Batiste won Album of the Year at the Grammys in 2022 despite much of the public not being as familiar with his name as Taylor Swift, Beyonce, or Billie Eilish. He has found one of the most pivotal years of his life as the focus of a new documentary. American Symphony, which looks at the highs and lows of 2022 for the musician and his partner/wife, is one of the most emotionally resonant documentaries of the year. Looking at the incredible success Jon Batiste experienced in his career despite the recurrence of leukemia in the love of his life, American Symphony will make you a fan of the man as much as his music.

American Symphony opens with a brief look at who Jon Batiste is. Born and raised in New Orleans, Batiste was brought up with music as an integral part of his life. As a member of the Batiste musical dynasty, Jon started playing drums in a family band before moving on to piano and other instruments. He attended Juilliard and formed his band, Stay Human, with fellow students. As his career began to take off, he became Colbert’s house band and found growing success on his path to a record eleven Grammy nominations in 2021. At the time, he was also in a relationship with Suleika Jaouad, a cancer survivor who penned an award-winning New York Times column before publishing a best-selling book about her experience with the diagnosis. American Symphony chronicles Batiste and Jaouad’s lives over a year as the musician pens his first symphony to be held at Carnegie Hall. At the same time, his partner learns that her cancer has returned. It is a gut-wrenching story of the cosmic dichotomy between happiness and sadness and the ties that bond a couple together to persevere through it.

This film is not a concert movie like Taylor Swift or Beyonce’s box office hits but rather a look at the unvarnished life of a person who appreciates his success while never having sought it to the degree he encountered in 2022. Batiste has also given access to unflattering elements of his life that some celebrities would have shied away from, including his personal struggles with anxiety as well as phone calls with his therapist. Batiste and Jaouad offer a look into their relationship and the difficult hurdles they must overcome. Jon travels frequently, never more than a phone call away from supporting Suleika as she undergoes the pain of chemotherapy. Still, the distance between them can be felt through the screen as Jon’s future gets brighter while Suleika’s grows dimmer. Through it all, the couple shares a love of music and artistry that infuses this entire film with a positive energy that makes you feel hopeful. This movie will make you feel things deeply beyond just appreciating the music on screen.

As the title suggests, American Symphony centers on the year-long development of Batiste’s first symphony. The audience gets an inside view into some of the bandleader’s creative choices, even involving multiple musicians and colleagues to help him create something distinct and original. The film does not delve deeply into the creative process as it teases how Batiste composes without spending much time on the minute details surrounding the composition of the title work. The film also looks at Batiste’s perception in the media and how being famous can simultaneously be a blessing and a curse. However, it does feel like a superficial nod and a missed opportunity to dig into that side of the story. So many elements are touched on through American Symphony but mostly through the lens of Batiste’s perception of them and not from other perspectives. We do hear quite a bit from Suleika, but it also is more of an offshoot of how her circumstances impact Jon’s.

Oscar and Emmy-nominated filmmaker Matthew Heineman captures the composition scale and grandeur of music in a way I did not expect from the director. Heineman is best known for films about healthcare (Escape Fire), Mexican drug lords (Cartel Land), ISIS (City of Ghosts), and the COVID-19 pandemic (The First Wave). In American Symphony, Heineman brings an unfiltered look that captures several moments that are emotionally resonant in a way I cannot compare to any other film in recent memory. Whether it be Suleika’s reaction to the physical pain of her treatment or Jon interacting with fans in an airport, countless small moments in this documentary hit authentically. Clocking in at an hour and forty minutes, I expected more of a dive into his music’s creation and the couple’s relationship with each other. However, the final act abruptly arrives, and we see Batiste’s performance of the title symphony with many elements still left unresolved. But that could very well be an intentional choice, as the movie is more about the journey than the destination.

It is fitting that this film is released close to Bradley Cooper’s acclaimed Maestro, a film about a very different musical genius whose relationship was key to his growth as a person and composer. What American Symphony succeeds in showing is the achievements that Jon Batiste has brought to music through an intimate look at his outlook on life and art and Suleika’s perseverance through unspeakable suffering. The two balance each other, and Matthew Heineman captures these in equal measure, making American Symphony a profoundly touching and emotional experience to watch. It will be impossible for anyone not to garner an appreciation for Jon Batiste as an artist and even more as a person after seeing this film. The glimpses we have of the performance of American Symphony tease the power the composer has as a creative talent and make this one of the better documentaries of the year.

American Symphony

GREAT

8