Director
Milos Forman
Cast
Tom Hulce - Wolfang Mozart
Elizabeth Berridge - Constanze Mozart
F. Murray Abraham - Antonio Salieri
Jeffrey Jones - Emperor Joseph II
Roy Dotrice - Leopold Mozart
Simon Callow - Emanuel Schikaneder
Charles Kay - Count Orsini-Rosenberg
I've wanted to write about the 1984 Milos Forman movie Amadeus for years. That's not an exaggeration. Years! But I couldn't form my thoughts into words well enough. I struggled with expressing my opinions in such a way to the point were I felt my thoughts about this colossal film were properly constructed enough. I didn't just want to pick it apart or analyze it. But the only way I can really discuss this movie is to consider specific aspects of how Amadeus tells its story.
Amadeus won eight Academy Awards including Best Picture for 1984. And it sits honorably at number 53 on the American Film Institute's "100 Years...100 Movies" list, sandwiched between From Here to Eternity and All Quiet on the Western Front.
This movie is so full of talent and genius (words I'm not using lightly) with its style, details, acting, casting, atmosphere, and structure. The history-based fiction in this film is remarkable in the way it's used to express a jealousy so strong it drives a man to madness.
I've seen Amadeus many times since first watching it back around 1999. I've even watched the director's cut several times. And I've often questioned if I really understood this film enough to write about it. Amadeus is a movie I greatly respect, and I'm going to write about it regardless of me second guessing myself.
It's a little funny that Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather tends to sit on the lofty pedestal of film perfection, which I won't argue against. For me, Amadeus sits on one that's a few inches higher. Both directors are very gifted which goes without saying when considering the notable films each has directed. Forman for instance directed One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ragtime, The People vs Larry Flynt and Man on the Moon. Coppola has Apocalypse Now and The Outsiders in his tally of films made.
While Amadeus and The Godfather deal with two completely different topics, one thing that stands out to me about Amadeus is how intense the story surrounding the character Antonio Salieri is. It's really who the movie is about.
The stereotype is that guys generally gravitate towards The Godfather, many of whom will hail it as the greatest of the greatest films. Perhaps The Godfather's depictions of strength, power, influence, wealth, and the polished corruption behind it all, so well depicted on screen, is what makes it such an engrossing film.
But the way Amadeus tells its story in such a unique way through the characters and music complimenting each other is absolutely impressive. I suppose it depends on relatability when comes to picking the better movie.
Plot
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| F. Murray Abraham as Antonio Salieri in Amadeus. |
An elderly Antonio Salieri (F. Murray Abraham) is found by his servants, bleeding on the floor with a self-inflicted slit to his neck.
Servants on foot carry him on a stretcher to a psychiatric hospital as the first movement of Mozart's Symphony No. 25 in G Minor plays. One quick cut away during this opening scene shows a ballroom were patrons are dancing to Mozart's score. It contrasts the severity of Salieri's self-inflicted damage with the harmony and uplifting mood of the jovial dancers thanks to Mozart's music, genius and spirit. In pain, Salieri glances up for a moment as though he can hear the music, and it's making things worse.
Night turns to morning. A Catholic priest, Fr. Vogler (Herman Meckler) arrives at the hospital to see Salieri, a classical composer and the Court Composer to Emperor Joseph II (Jeffrey Jones) of Austria.
When Fr. Vogler is shown to Salieri's room, he finds the old musician in a wheelchair, alone and bandaged, playing on a fortepiano - an instrument seen often in the film.
As the priest tries to encourage Salieri to make a good confession, based on his anguishing cries the night before, Salieri simply tells him, "leave me alone."
This is my favorite opening to any movie.
As the priest says he cannot leave a soul alone in vein, Salieri barks "do you know who I am?"
When the priest responds "All men are equal in God's eyes" this is what grabs Salieri's attention enough to turn and speak with the priest, starting with his snide remark, "Are they?"
Salieri glares and shifts the conversation with, "how well are you trained in music?"
Fr. Vogler says he's trained a little as he studied music as a child in Vienna.
He then plays a game with Fr. Vogler, challenging him to a round of name that tune.
Salieri plays a piece of music that the priest doesn't recognize, which turns out to be something Salieri wrote years ago.
He plays another piece of music that the priest is unfamiliar with. This tune is from one of his operas which is playing in Salieri's mind.
"Can you recall no melody of mine?" he asks.
Then he smiles and plays another piece, and Fr. Vogler instantly recognizes it. In fact, he starts singing along to it.
"Yes, I know that. Well, that's charming. I'm sorry I didn't know you wrote that."
With an "I told you so" look on his face, Salieri responds, "I didn't. That...was Mozart."
It's Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik.
The memory of whom forces Salieri to open up, beginning with his admiration of the musician that began when Salieri was a young boy desiring to be a composer much to his father's disapproval.
The story is told through flashbacks.
Salieri's life changes after he prays what he calls the "proudest prayer a boy could think of."
During a mass one particular day, he lovingly gazes up to a crucifix.
"Lord, make me a great composer! Let me celebrate your glory through music - and be celebrated myself. Make me famous through the world, dear God. Make me immortal! After I die let people speak my name forever with love for what I wrote."
In return, young Salieri offers God his chastity, industry, and deepest humility. (Humility - after begging to be loved and honored the world over even after his death. Seriously?)
And then, what happens next confirms in his mind that this is what God wants of him.
Salieri's father, who held him back from what doing what Mozart did, dies after choking during a meal.
Thus begins Salieri's answered prayers. Before he knows it, he finds himself in Vienna - the City of Musicians - where he works alongside Emperor Joseph II as his Court Composer.
When he has his first encounter with Mozart, what he finds is nothing close to what he pictured his whole life. His first impression of Mozart is as an obscene and indecent "dirty minded creature." He spots him chasing a girl, Constanze (Elizabeth Berridge) on the floor of an empty room, telling fart jokes and making lewd remarks. This is the same gloriously talented musician he admired all his life. This is were the movie really begins.
Salieri's infatuation slowly changes to his bewilderment as to why God would give a buffoon like Mozart such a miraculous talent. Meanwhile he, a faithful servant who is more than willing to offer God His due praise through music (while being celebrated himself the world over) has to beg for it.
God answers his prayers, of course. But it's not enough.
This conversation between Salieri and Fr. Vogler begins in the morning. As the film progresses, morning turns into night. And when Salieri is finished, it's morning once again.
Thoughts
This claim of theirs was based on a scene where Salieri, driven by jealousy and pride, casts off religion by throwing his crucifix into a fire. It was also based on the ending, where this person claimed Salieri is made to look like the good guy at the end.
Really? A twisted and consumed Salieri, who tried to kill himself and is now in an insane asylum, is made to look like the hero? Some people only see what the want to see.
Amadeus, the drama of dramas in my opinion, is based on Peter Shaffer's play, which is inspired by a play called Mozart & Salieri written in 1892 by Russian Playwright Alexander Pushkin. Therefore, there's not as much historical accuracy in the movie as some might think. But it's not meant to be historically accurate in the first place.
I admit it took me a while to really figure out the moral of the story.
Self-centered Salieri, who is a genius with music, allows his inflamed passion for greatness to get in the way of his talent. That part is easy to understand.
His pride and jealousy, and the consistent presumption that God has it out for him, drives him to an asylum.
God gives him what he prayed for, but he didn't receive it in the packaging (figuratively speaking) he expected.
So, he views Mozart as some kind of God-made mockery of his own talent, and an obstacle to the greatness he believes God and the world owes him because he made a superfluous vow in exchange for personal greatness. He changes his goal to be a great musician into destroying God's work.
He wants to wallow in his narcissistic stew of anger and self-pity that fuels his hatred for God and Mozart, both of whom he wants to be like.
He wants to be Mozart because he truly believes he can be better at it. Mozart's music, after all, is Salieri's second love after himself. Since he's not Mozart, he comes to the conclusion that he must then be a mediocrity.
"I am their patron saint," he tells the priest.
The problem is the praise he receives isn't like Mozart's.
Mozart may be immature, but so is Salieri...even more so.
In one scene, Mozart is invited to meet with Emperor Joseph so he can commission an opera from him. Salieri composes a small march of welcome for Mozart to be played on the fortepiano.
Before the scene ends, Mozart comments how he has the tune already in his head after one hearing.
He plays the tune back, and says in front of Salieri that the tune seems to lack. And then right in front of him and the Emperor, he improves it off the top of his head.
The audience can see the hatred build on the face of Salieri, thanks to the phenomenal acting of F. Murray Abraham. The seen is capped with Mozart's giddy laughing, which sounds like glass breaking.
It's a laugh that Salieri tells the priest later in the movie, "That was not Mozart laughing, Father...that was God. That was God laughing at me through that obscene giggle."
The scene shifts to Salieri glaring bitterly at a crucifix on his bedroom wall. He's like an angry and dejected child taking his anger out on God.
"Gracie, signore" he says mockingly.
"Gracie, signore" he says mockingly.
The movie isn't an attack on God. It's an attack on want versus need. It's a depiction of how far jealousy can take someone. It's a sketch, almost, of the section in St. Matthew's Gospel that says, "What does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul." Good question! What does it profit a man? And the world is what he was asking God for. He more or less got it, and he wasn't happy. His own hell started pretty quickly.
Mozart is like a very early modern celebrity musician or rock star. Fame can be a dangerous thing to any person no matter what century they live in. Actress Carrie Fisher said fame is obscurity biding its time.
He's incredibly gifted. He squanders his money frivolously. He drinks heavily. He loves parties. He's immature. His passions consume him. He ruins his reputation. And he has been adored and paraded since he was a boy. It's not the first time such a tale has been told about celebrities up until now. But despite all that, to Mozart's credit, he doesn't squander his musical talent. He embraces it and takes it as far as it'll go.
What impresses me most about Amadeus, to the point were I hold it in such high regard, is the way it uses music. Music is much more than background noise telling the audience how they should feel.
Music is used three different ways in this movie. And not all of it is Mozart's.
Some of it is used to convey emotions as soundtracks are meant to do. The Stabat Mater composed by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi is used in the early part of the movie when a young Salieri is praying to God for a gift in music. It was written in 1736 - 20 years before Mozart was born. It's in sync with the events on screen.
At other times music indicates where Mozart is in his life, either physically or mentally, such as the scene where he performs his Concerto for Two Pianos in an outdoor concert for the Emperor.
Music is also used to show the audience what's happening in Mozart's head.
In the same scene at the palace of the Archbishop of Salzburg, Salieri is in attendance to hear Mozart perform. He has never seen Mozart in person until this point. He wants to read a sheet of music for Mozart's Serenade for Winds to gain insight into how he writes.
As Salieri looks over the lines of notes, juxtaposed with old Salieri explaining the music to Fr. Vogner, we hear the opening of the piece with an unwavering oboe hanging on a single note until a clarinet takes over, and the oboe fades away. The music accompanies his descriptions. It all abruptly ends when Mozart snatches the sheet music off the stand.
This way of depicting music is really used when Mozart is composing his Requiem Mass, the text of which brings to Mozart and Salieri a brief conversation on death and judgement, and Hell. Sometimes all Mozart can hear is the music in his head. This use of music provides insight. It's its own character in the story.
Nothing is cheap nor are any corners cut in this movie. Not one note of Mozart's music was changed or altered for the sake of the film per the request of conductor Sir Neville Marriner (considered one of the world's greatest conductors) whose Academy of St. Martin in the Fields supervised and performed the score to Amadeus.
Forman shot the movie in Prague and Kroměříž in the Czech Republic. He also filmed some of the movie inside the Count Nostitz Theater in Prague, which is the same theater Mozart's Don Giovanni and La clemenza di Tito premiered in 1791. Filming in the Czech Republic occurred during the nation's Communist era.
I'm really struggling to find fault in Amadeus outside of its historical inaccuracy. The movie doesn't claim to be a biographical film, though.
Early rumors of a deadly rivalry between Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri where boiled over when Pushkin, mentioned above, wrote his play. But from what I read, there's no evidence proving the real Salieri had it in for Mozart, and that he attempted to kill him.
Personally, I find the historical fiction of the film just as fascinating as the historical facts.
While the acting is fantastic, especially with Tom Hulce and F. Murray Abraham perfectly cast, I particularly enjoy Jeffery Jones as the Emperor.
He clearly admires him while keeping on his royal face. It's a small detail in the movie that's full of magnificent settings and atmosphere.
My God, this film is superb.
And before I forget, The Godfather is number three on that list of 100 movies.
Anyways, to quote the Emperor, "Well, there it is."
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