Director Pablo Larraín, who made a film on Jackie Kennedy (“Jackie”) and one on Princess Diana (“Spencer”), has produced a bio-film of Maria Callas which has extensive historic scenes of Callas in her most famous roles. The film, titled “Maria,” is essentially about her final years in Paris and her death, but has many flashbacks to both stage appearances and aspects of her life. Although initially, the thought of Hollywood goddess Angelina Jolie playing Callas is hard to stomach, she does very well, lip-synching some of Callas’s classic roles, in addition to videos of the actual performances. She reportedly took intensive voice lessons to learn to breathe and articulate according to the bel canto method for which Callas is renowned, and even sings parts of the arias presented.
The movie opens with Jolie lip-synching Desdemona’s heartbreaking aria from Verdi’s Otello in the prayer “Ave Maria,” as she prepares for what she anticipates will be her murder by her husband Otello. It is one of Maria Callas’s most powerful and poignant arias and sets the stage for the drama. The film begins with a brief scene of Callas’s death in her Paris apartment, and concludes with her singing, for herself alone, of “Vissi d’Arte” from Pucccini’s Tosca, asking why she, whose life had been devoted to art and love, was being subjected to such horror (Tosca had been told that the tyrant, the Chief of Police of Rome, would release her lover from torture only if she submitted to his lust).
The film follows Callas’s decline, both the decline in her vocal capacities and her submission to drugs as her career and her personal life deteriorate, even while she tries to restore her voice.
The flashbacks provide wonderful performances of her greatest roles, including “Casta Diva” from Bellini’s Norma, “Ebben” from Catalani’s La Wally; “Qui la Voce Sua Soave” from Bellini’s I Puritani (which was her debut appearance on stage); “Sempre Libera” from Verdi’s La Traviata; and “Piangeto Voi?” from Donizetti’s Anna Bolena.
