Angelina Jolie’s Callas will open in just eight US theatres
OperaThree arthouses in New York and five in Los Angeles have been named for the film’s release tonight.
The reason to secure big screens for the film, before it goes to Netflix, is so that it can be considered for an Oscar.
No sign of a box-office rush, though.
I like Jolie, but she and the director seem to be playing a dangerous game in the PR run up to the release, trying to intimate she’s actually singing in the movie. She may be doing *something* while moving her mouth in tandem to Callas’ recordings in this movie’s scenes, but it is not operatic singing. Six months of “training” does not equal anything in the classical voice world, and whatever technical wizardry they did to try to add her voice to Callas’ will equate to nothing.
With AI, there is no need to have the dichotomy of the past of either your voice or archival voice, it could be a blend.
For that matter, with AI, there could be a blend of the physiognomy of the historical figure and the actor.
Today, we can no longer tell the difference for background shots with CGI, and frankly we no longer care, I for one just assume everything was shot in an empty room with a green background.
They keep saying that classical music is dead but in just a few short years Hollywood has brought out “Tar,” “Maestro,” “Chevalier” and now this.
Go figure.
And not a winner among them. Tar and Maestro were dreadful. Like most of the rest of the world, I did not see Chevalier.
What about The Song of Names?
The best film set in the world of classical music in recent decades is The Red Violin.
Add to that list the 2019 movie “Pavarotti” by director Ron Howard (Apollo 13, Da Vinci Code etc.). I guess it was interesting for those who knew little of the tenor’s career other than his singing “Nessun Dorma” as the television theme song for the 1990 Soccer World Cup or the Three Tenors Rome concert. But with his widow and recording company having put up some of the funding, it was never going to be much more than a puff piece.
Classical music lovers do love declaring the death of classical music (a strange masochistic trait).
Also, none of the classical music-related films satisfy classical music lovers. We don’t understand that they’re not made for us but for a broader audience that’s not looking for a film rendition of the Wikipedia page of Composer X or Artist Y.
They don’t seem to have satisfied non-classical music lovers either. Tar tanked at the box office. Maestro started better on the reputations of Bradley Cooper and Carey Mulligan but failed on word of mouth because it was just a lousy movie.
I can think of much better films ABOUT classical music, or its world — Meeting Venus, about a staging of Tannhauser, is fantastic, but I don’t think it was box office, despite the then-high riding Glenn Close in a leading role.
The best and most successful modern film with a classical music basis (or one of its bases) is Diva.
MARIA is also playing at Landmark’s Ritz Five theater in Philadelphia (Nov 27 – Dec 5, 2024).
It’s also Landmark in the DC area so that’s likely the chain they’re going with nationally. It was also Landmark for Maestro, which was also a Netflix production so that might be why.
Curious. It’s playing all over Canada, in Cineplexes and other chains.
I will be seeing it at the Landmark Theater in Pasadena, California. A small arthouse cinema with crappy sound system but big comfy reclining chairs. The MetHD screenings there are consistently bad; for those I go to the big AMC Theaters.
I saw Maria at the film festival. It was barely tolerable. The cast made a bow from one of the balconies at the end, but I made a beeline for the exit before the Q&A. The brilliant documentary Maria by Callas (or even Zoe Caldwell in Masterclass or the numerous Callas interviews available on YouTube) is much more worth the time. Jolie is attractive and pouts well, but she lacks the true beauty, style, character, and passion of the real Callas. Worthy project in concept, which unfortunately misfired.
Did the Fanny Ardant version get this much breathless hype?
You’re wrong. I’m watching it tonight in Washington, DC and it’s running in two theatres in the DC area.
Do consider that “I (UK-based critic) only know of 8 U.S. theatres where it’s showing” is NOT the same as “It’s only running in 8 theatres.”
That is clearly totally wrong. I have a choice of half a dozen cinemas within my immediate orbit in which to see it. But on the strength of the feedback, I’ll wait for online when I can turn it off and cut my losses without inconvenience or expense.
(Not a great Jolie fan anyway — never was. I am trying to think of any film I liked her in. I did not hate her in A Mighty Heart, but that was because I was so sympathetic to the character. I could think of many others who would have played Mrs. Pearl better.).
Let’s cheer it on! The fact that it was even made is a miracle.
It’s a sign, along with Tar, Maestro and perhaps a few others that there are beating hearts in the film industry who think classical music and the people in it are interesting, and that stories set in this milieu might appeal widely. So far, it remains a noble thought, but since Diva it has simply not worked.
Amadeus worked as a movie. (I didn’t care for it, but it was an undeniable success both critically and commercially). Immortal Beloved, which tried to cash in, was rather less successful.
The modern film that has done more for classical music than any other I can think of is Elvira Madigan. Sales of Mozart’s 21st piano concerto apparently went through the roof, and millions of people who would not know a quaver from a crotchet immediately recognise the second movement if it comes on the radio.
The same could be said about the adagietto from Mahler V after Visconti’s “Death in Venice”.
“Film”? That implies celluloid, of course, and is good to note.
I won’t be going near anything involving Angelina Jolie anyway. Her father, on the other hand, was/is an acting virtuoso. (See Konchalovsky’s “Runaway Train”, just to name one.)
Political choices, here.
Headline is incorrect. Opens in several theaters in Minneapolis tonight (and, as noted in previous comment, in DC and other Landmark theaters nationwide).