Maria Callas

Just watched the film at a film festival. Our entire group was disappointed by what we watched.

The story line was paper thin to us, focused on the last part of her life, with major parts of the history around how events tied together left out. We would move from one scene to another without a clear link between sequences.

The focus seemed to center around Jolie posing for us, rather removed of the charm of the real Maria. I get it - Angelina is gorgeous but where was the spark?

I never felt like I connected with the characters and didn't feel bought into the film. There was a hollowness to this version of Maria Callas.

At the end of the film, as the end credits start, there are scenes of the real Maria Callas - full of personality and charisma - which were unfortunately not portrayed in Jolie's performance.

Gorgeous costume designs but that was it for me.

I come at this from a different angle. I was an opera singer for many years, and I did an E! Mysteries and Scandals about Maria Callas.

Though Angelina Jolie is luminous in the role, this was not really representative of the real Maria Callas. This is the fault of the script and the approach of the director.

First, I could have used more music instead of most of it being in the background. We see an audience standing and screaming "Bravo" after "Qui la voce." Except we didn't hear "Qui la voce," just a few bars and none of the coloratura.

This aloof attitude Callas had during her interviews, etc. Was not Maria. The interview she gave John Ardoin, where she asked that the tapes not be played until she was dead, with the most heartbreaking thing you would ever hear in your life. She was miserable, codependent, and never got over her relationship with Onassis. She was a very damaged woman. I really did not get a lot of of that from this film. Just an opinion.

There were also inaccuracies, but that's to be expected in a script that has to telescope a life.

Maria Callas was a great artist and a deeply complicated human being. This film did not come close to who she was.

I agree with blanche-2 and other reviewers, as a former opera student for many years and opera lover and connoisseur.

This may be a delight for those who like Angelina Jolie and like to see a beatiful face on screen, but nothing here resembles the unique quality of divine Maria.

For starters, this is the worse lip-sync I have seen in my life in a biopic of a singer, and it was a surprise that a movie supposed to be a first-rate production went ahead ignoring this major failure. After all, singing is to the essence of the film, it is not a secondary scene. And if you want to recreate Callas life using real recordings, the performative effort must be flawless. Of course it is as hard as demanding, but if you want to compare Jolie's playback what a remarkable, well-executed example, please watch La Mome, the biopic about Edith Piaf, and find delight in Marion Cotillard's perfect, unbelievably good execution. (Jolie's lack of sync is as unbelievable.)

Then, the physique du role. Jolie is one of the most beautiful actresses of our time. But it has physical disparities with Callas which cannot be solved with make-up, and the lack of resemblance spoils the effort. Callas's beauty was tempered, life-chiseled, acquired, a result of a deep effort at self-awareness and self-hardening and reshaping her destiny. That kind of subjective process simply «showed» in her regal attitude, and imposing scenic presence. Jolie is a born beauty, her beauty a gift given from the start, and, in my opinion, she did not manage to convey the dramatic depth of Callas's appeal enough as to create the magical impression that we are seeing a credible Callas.

Also, for those who love opera, Jolie's embouchure (the singers' «mouth mould») is a joke, nothing close to the unmistaken bel canto mouth frame which opera singers (and Callas) distinctively employ. It may seem an unimportant detail, but the sum of inconsistencies and lack of attention to detail ends up being irritating.

I have not listed other observations already pointed by reviewers, which which I concur, related to the use of music score, plot and realism. I really wanted to like the movie, but it was a total disappointment to me.

This movie came as a pleasant surprise to me.

It is not only the great,studied performance by Jolie,an actress that hadn't really convinced me of her ability to act up to now. Nevertheless,in this movie,all the self-admiring,borderline narcissistic traits are absent.

Jolie,immerses herself in Maria's fragile, overall declining character and produces a more than convincing portrait worth accolades.

The representation of the era is quite meticulous too.

The really pleasant surprises are the directorial approach and the screenplay.

Focusing on her last week before dying it has a balanced approach to her memories through few flashbacks,her past and current relations,her adoration of music and opera,her failing health,her feeble attempts for a comeback,her warped perception of reality through the use of a slew of barbiturates,her nostalgia,her need for adulation and love. All in proper doses.

A fine two hours spent getting in touch with Maria..not the Callas!!!

Maria is a solid musical bio pic. A great lead performance from Angelina Jolie holds this movie together pretty well and I admire how much she put into this role, especially the opera singing. The plot is a little messy and the pacing is a tad off but I still think the movie is purely entertaining enough to enjoy and it is also educational about this time period and opera in general. It's a beautifully shot and directed movie. I love the editing and the black and white shots are gorgeous. I think this is a solid film from Pablo Larrain with a potential Oscar winning performance from Angelina Jolie.