Epic: On the Cello – Jacqueline du Pré

On the Cello: Jacqueline du Pré: Genius and Tragedy

The 17th EpOS Film Festival

Documentary / United Kingdom, United States, 2025 / English, Hebrew subtitles / 86 min
Directed by: Matthew Percival, Christopher Nupen

Sometimes, a film simply needs a captivating personality for audiences to fall in love with, and Jacqueline du Pré was exactly that. Her smile, her captivating presence, the marvelous music she produced from the cello, and the fact that her remarkable career, which began when she was still a child, was cut short at the age of 28 by a serious illness—all these things made her an admired figure during her lifetime, and even more so after her death.

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma tells du Pré’s life story in the film: from her childhood and rivalry with her flutist sister Hilary, through her unprecedented success and performances that continually filled concert halls, her love story and marriage to Daniel Barenboim (they married in Israel when they came here during the Six-Day War), until she developed multiple sclerosis and became disabled in her final years. Du Pré recorded Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto—the work most closely associated with her name—at the age of 20. Eight years later, she was forced to stop playing.