Kelvin Harrison Jr is especially mesmerising when playing gifted characters whose multi-faceted brilliance can’t protect them from alienation, despair and anger (Waves; Monster; Luce). Excellent at mapping the limits of excellence, the 28 year-old American actor is again reliably compelling as the real-life 18th century marvel, violinist and composer Joseph Bologne, whose almost total erasure from history should make us all spit with rage.
In this playful biopic, winning, initially, is the name of the game. Jaunty Joseph – born in Guadeloupe, the illegitimate son of a Senegalese maid and plantation-owning Frenchman – is first seen having a violin play-off, in Paris, with a peevish Mozart, over whom our hero triumphs.
