‘Liza: A Truly Terrific Absolutely True Story’ review: Minnelli in close-up

Dir: Bruce David Klein. US. 2025. 104mins

Liza Minnelli has been giving us that old razzle dazzle for decades, and she remains a magnetic presence at the heart of this cosy and catchy celebration of her life and work. She is joined in Bruce David Klein’s documentary by a chorus of old friends – both famous and not – who, rather than chronologically tackle her life, zoom in on what might be considered some of her greatest hits with a view to exploring the influences that helped shape her talent. 

Klein has a strong grasp on all of the material

Having premiered at last year’s Tribeca, the documentary has been hot-footing it around the festival circuit since, with its latest curtain call in Thessaloniki. It has had a warm reception from US fans since its Zeitgeist release Stateside in January, and may well repeat the feat in other territories through Dogwoof. 

Klein, who has previously profiled rocker Meatloaf (Meatloaf: In Search Of Paradise, 2007) and American businessman Carl Icahn (Icahn: The Restless Billionaire, 2022) chiefly focuses on the decade or so following the death of Minnelli’s mother Judy Garland in 1969, when Minnelli was just 23. This is framed as a story of the star stepping out of the shadow of Judy and that of her famous Gigi director father Vincente Minnelli to, as the American songbook might say, find her own voice.

The director’s cherry-picking approach means many things fall by the wayside – there’s no mention of Minnelli’s role opposite Dudley Moore in 1981’s Arthur, for example, or her later-life turn as Lucille Austero in Arrested Development. The plus side is that it makes more room for Klein and his contributors to focus on certain aspects of Minnelli’s rise to fame, and the emotional and professional impact of key people in her life

Rise to fame is, perhaps, not a term that should be used for Minnelli, as she was essentially born into it. The early part of her life was impacted by Garland’s well-documented problems. Among the film’s wealth of archive footage is is the moment in which Minnelli sang with her mother at the London Palladium in 1964, the young woman’s voice already a showstopper. Beyond being a celebration of her natural talent, clips like this are a springboard for contributors, including singer, pianist and close friend Michael Feinstein, to offer more psychological observations. In this case, it becomes a dissection of Garland’s less than nurturing reaction to her daughter receiving applause.    

Broken into chapters headed by forthright quotes including, ’Emphasise what is good. What you don’t like, change it’, Klein highlights key mentors in Liza’s life, from singer and vocal coach Kay Thompson, who became like a surrogate mother following Garland’s death, through Cabaret director/choreographer Bob Fosse, French singer Charles Aznavour and fashion designer Halston. Other interviewees include life-long pal, the actor Mia Farrow, Cabaret co-star Joel Grey and half-sister Lorna Luft.

Minnelli’s meticulous approach is evident in the way we see her instructing Klein to move the camera about, noting as she does that although she’s “her mother’s daughter”, there’s a lot of her father in there too. “Liza will never go on camera and talk about the dirt,” we’re told and that appears to be true, although her coterie is more willing to fill in the gaps. While the film doesn’t quite gloss over her numerous romantic relationships, Klein’s speedy approach refuses to let the focus stray from Liza’s stage and screen talent for long.

The director also deploys telling clips from an extensive archive. We repeatedly see Minnelli batting away questions about her mother, a tip she learned from Cabaret and Liza With A Z lyricist Fred Ebb. The vulnerability that several of her friends refer to also comes through, including in previously unseen backstage footage from a European tour.  Meanwhile her star quality shines and sparkles in a plethora of clips from stage shows and films including  Cabaret and Martin Scorsese’s New York, New York. 

Klein has a strong grasp on all of the material, and editors Jake Keen and Alexander J Goldstein cut it together it carefully so that the past and the present often meet. This is particularly moving in a moment when Liza, singing while Michael plays the piano, is intercut with older footage of her singing the same song, making for a poignant duet. Despite galloping past certain chunks of her biography, Klein also unearths plenty of details. Robert De Niro’s hatred for the first incarnation of New York, New York, for example, or Halston’s decision to create her signature sequin look because it wouldn’t show the sweat. 

That last observation speaks to the sheer weight of effort Minnelli has put in down the years. She may have been born into the spotlight. but she is the one who has made it her own.