Amadeus the Film - Movie Review Example

The atrocities of the royal couple in France are well - known. Marie apparently influenced Joseph to keep a strict control on any art and culture developments in Austria, which might turn subversive. These facts seep casually into the narrative through Joseph II's dialogues. An otherwise liberal man, Joseph had an Italian triumvirate to advise him on 'proper' entertainment. Salieri was part of this trio. The handful of musicians and artists who enjoyed royal patronage stayed on the right side of royalty and composed pieces in Italian that very few understood, eschewed ballet as debauched and favored themes that would offend no one and cause no one to think.

The film shows this beautifully, through skillfully chosen characters, their pompous stance and carefully cultivated expressions. It was in this atmosphere that Wolfgang arrived in Vienna, freshly banished by the Archbishop at Salzburg. Unrepentant and arrogant, he did not believe he had any rivals. He was simply the best while others composed rubbish. Mozart is the polar opposite of a serious composer. The audacious Amadeus and his artless wife giggled their way through mindless entertainment, were very bad debtors and yet had a strange dignity about them; there was self belief and belief in each other.

Constanza took in her stride her husband's lack of practical sense, gently coaxed and cajoled him into doing things to earn money, was ready to trade her body for a night to buy him a tutorship to royalty, but was impractical enough to estrange a concerned and well-heeled father in law. Of course, the movie has taken liberties with facts, for instance, Mozart's sister Nannerl, who was actually quite an influence on him is completely done away with, as are the many children that Mozart and Constanza had.

Retaining them in the story would have underscored the pathos of his isolation and gradual slide into drunken desperation. However, none of this prevents him from composing brilliantly. One of his first commissions was to write the score for an opera - a Turkish folk story set in a harem (Mozart's choice of subject) in German (the emperor's choice of language). The turca-allegro form uses sopranos for the fun element and a heavily textured orchestra. This was the first of many deviations that Mozart would insist on.

The film, which opens with one of his famous tutti with a signature tremolo and a heavy orchestra scores, is peppered with snatches of his work -the conventional chamber music to entertain the royal family, writing Masses and so on. They are rightly not mentioned prominently because of their huge numbers; but they are representative of Mozart's style of playing upon a single note or phrase before launching into symphony. The movie gives music lovers and aficionados a delicious slice of the music of the classical era through Mozart's pieces.

Both the sonata allegro and the sonata rondo are in evidence. The Marriage of Figaro is trademark Mozart - rich in notes, too much for the untutored Viennese public to take. The emperor famously remarked that it had too many notes to which Mozart had made the equally famous reply that it had not one note too many and had gone on to audaciously ask -which would you have me remove, superbly establishing himself as the master of his craft . Figaro, with it risqu Italian intrigue was originally rejected as subject (apparently it had caused unrest against the royalty in France) but later allowed.

The same fate met the ballet in the marriage