Film Mozart by Milos Forman - Essay Example

Starring Tom Hulce as the classical composer Mozart, director Milos Forman took the 1979 libretto of the musical play by Schaffer and turned it into a modern classic of high admiration among high brow film aficionados. The music of the film is based on the original works of Mozart leaves the viewers glued to their seats as the film unfolds in relation to the chosen musical pieces. It was this music that gripped my interest when I first sat down to watch the film for our class. I cannot fault the film for its musical brilliance and its painstaking attention to the small details that went into the production of this movie.

However, there were a few things about the production itself that struck me as odd. Simply because I found it hard to swallow a crossover of influences between the historical world of Mozart and the modern era of the 1980s. To begin with, I never expected to hear modern English slang being spoken in a film such as Amadeus. I had thought that the original play creator and then the Hollywood filmmaker would have done their best to stay true to the language of the era being portrayed. A necessary point, in my opinion, that adds to the authentic feel of the movie experience.

The gyrating laughter of Tom Hulce also got on my nerves later on. I understand from the narration that the reason the laughter sounded that way was that it was meant to offend Salieri who felt that God mocked his talents by bestowing an immense talent in the spoiled brat name Mozart. This is also another point that left me wishing that the filmmakers had taken greater care in their portrayal of Mozart in the film. The heavily fictionalized account of the life and times of Mozart has become the basis by which most of today's students first get to know about the prolific composer.

However, because the film does not present an accurate account of his life and the people of notable influence upon him, Mozart is instead seen as a madman who was always in need of money and uncaring for both his wife and child. In the end, I feel that the film has withstood the test of time and is still enjoyable today, provided you can suspend disbelief for over 3 hours of film time. It is like Wikipedia in my opinion. A good jumping-off point in getting to know Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, but with so many factual errors that one must remember to take everything they see on the screen with a grain of salt.