Maria (2024) Movie Review
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It's been a long time since Angelina Jolie has delivered a performance that seems Oscar-worthy, and now we're watching her latest film, Maria, which marks her return to acting after 2021's The Death Wishers and The Eternals. nominations. Since the film received an eight-minute standing ovation at its Venice premiere, Jolie's portrayal of the famous late opera singer Maria Callas is considered the favorite for next year's Oscar for Best Actress. Most who have seen Maria have praised her performance and are curious to know if she actually lived up to the hype. Maria is now streaming on Afdah Stream.
When I finally streamed the film on Netflix, I was impressed with Jolie's dedication to the craft. She reportedly underwent nearly seven months of vocal training for the opera singer role, and the film mixes her own singing voice with recordings of Callas, which she does very well. She also deserves praise for embodying Callas' diva-like looks and personality with enough grace and poise. After watching some of her old interviews on YouTube, she may not match Callas' thick accent, but she still speaks well in an old Hollywood twang that recalls the mid-Atlantic accent used in the era of black-and-white movies. Strongly pronounced.
But Jolie's committed performance alone is not enough to make up for Pablo Larraín's strangely understated rendition of the legendary opera singer, acclaimed as one of the best sopranos of the 20th century. Maria is the third and final film in a trilogy of iconic 20th-century women, which began with Natalie Portman's Jackie (2016) as Jacqueline Kennedy and Kristen Stewart's Spencer (2021) as Princess Diana.
Based on a screenplay by Spencer's Steven Knight, the story focuses primarily on the final days of Callas's Parisian life, when he's no longer in the spotlight as he once was. Before her unfortunate death from a heart attack on September 16, 1977, at the age of 53, Callas was already weakened, as she was visibly thin and even lost her voice. However, she is still determined to sing and spends her time rehearsing, relying heavily on medication to get through, particularly a sedative called Mandrax. The medication causes her to hallucinate, and there are occasional moments when reality and imagination collide. One of these revolves around Maria's interview with a ghostly TV journalist, ironically named Mandrax (Kodi Smit-McPhee), and director Larraín employs a variety of visual techniques to portray Maria's increasingly blurred state of mind.
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