Maria: Film Review
After Jackie and Spencer, Pablo Larrain completes his trilogy of films about legendary women with Maria, a biographical drama about the opera sensation Maria Callas (Angelina Jolie).
Like the previous two, Maria focuses on a short and specific time in the star’s life. This story takes place over the course of a week – the last week of her life in September 1977. She lives a lonely existence in her Paris apartment, with only her trusty butler Ferruccio (Pierfrancesco Favino) and housekeeper Bruna (Alba Rohrwacher) for company. She gave up performing four years ago as it was making her sick but she wants to get her declining voice back.
The film, written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, has an introspective, dream-like quality and tries to help us understand the singer’s headspace. Maria, who is taking a lot of medication, spends her final days wandering around Paris and reminiscing about the past (particularly her romance with Aristotle Onassis), pretending she’s being interviewed by journalist Mandrax (Kodi Smit-McPhee) and taking hallucinatory trips down memory lane. It’s clear that she’s incredibly lonely and lost without her voice and her love.
I don’t know much about the real Callas so I cannot address the factual accuracy of the story or Jolie’s portrayal. She doesn’t look much like her but that didn’t matter to me. Jolie gives an extraordinary performance that I found quietly moving. She does a stunning job of portraying Callas’ outer strength and poise and inner vulnerability and sadness. I was particularly impressed by her singing scenes. Although she was helped by recordings of the real soprano, I was totally convinced I was watching her do it, especially as you could see how much it meant to her. I would be happy if she won the Oscar this year.
Her relationship with Ferruccio and Bruna is very meaningful. They are all she has left and have worked for her for so long they’re basically family. They are loyal and caring and try to encourage her to look after herself without overstepping their bounds. Favino and Rohrwacher are wonderful in these roles.
I also want to give a shout-out to the costume and production design teams. The whole film looks beautiful but I was particularly blown away by the recreations of some of Callas’s famous operas and a surreal Madame Butterfly sequence.
Maria is a poignant film that made me wonder what memories I would revisit in my final days. Beautiful.
In cinemas from Friday 10th January
Rating: 4 out of 5.
