Maria, following the release of Jackie (2016) and Spencer (2021), is the latest biopic directed by Pablo Larrain that depicts the life of an influential woman in the public eye during the 20th century. Angelina Jolie portrays Maria Callas, a renowned opera singer, as she looks back on her life, during her final days alive.
Maria is accompanied by dogs and her close, moving relationship with her butler, Ferruccio, and her housemaid, Bruna, who struggles with Callas’ worsening condition. Her other main companion is the personified figure of Callas’ abuse of Mandrax, a sedative that was later discontinued, in the form of a filmmaker of the same name who follows the star around Paris in her last week alive. The effect of this technique is profound, as Callas reminisces on the events of her life and reflects on the sense of her former glory to somebody is—in reality— a drug-induced hallucination, not a doting documentary journalist.
The loss of Maria Callas’ voice by the end of her life is presented as a major source of this pain, and her hallucinations appear to centre around this intense grief at the loss of the woman she used to be, which is compounded by her real and scathing media portrayal. The audience feels the tragedy of this conundrum through Callas’ loving friendship with Ferruccio and Bruna, as she cannot see through the pain of her experience that she has so much more to offer than her career.
Overall, my initial impression of the film was the attention spent on beautifully cinematic shots and raising of important themes with creative subtlety. Issues with biopics, or biographical films, as a genre remains an understandably contentious topic amid criticisms of filmmakers glamourising the struggles of real people for shock value. Larrain portrays the complexities of Maria Callas’ life and struggles in a manner which felt, naturally, dramatised for cinema and cannot, therefore, be indicative of any historical truth or the real Maria Callas’ personal experience. Yet, the general focus on her passion for opera centres the person and her passions alongside questions of media scrutiny, self-destruction for art, and loss in a powerful manner.