The Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larraín has a kind of strange fixation on telling fictionalized stories of iconic women from the 20th century captured during brief periods in painful moments of isolation, with world-famous actresses portraying the world-famous figures. In the Natalie Portman-starring historical drama “Jackie” (2016), we followed Jacqueline Kennedy in the immediate aftermath of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, while “Spencer” (2021) had Kristen Stewart portraying Princess Diana during Christmas of 1991, as she was frozen out by the royal family, with her marriage to Charles in tatters.
Now comes “Maria,” with Angelina Jolie doing magnificent work as the legendary American Greek operatic soprano Maria Callas during the final days of Callas’ life, spent largely in her spacious apartment flat in 1977 Paris, with only her butler, her housekeeper, her poodles and her memories and hallucinations to keep her company. This is an exquisitely filmed and at times deeply melancholy portrait of an artist who had once made the rafters of great opera houses hum with her bel canto technique and had been mobbed by fans and adored by millions, but spent her last week surrounded by the echoes of sadness.
“Maria” employs the tired framing device of an interview with the title subject, with Kodi Smith-McPhee in a thinly drawn role as a TV documentarian who has an almost obsessive interest in getting the great Maria Callas to tell all about her professional triumphs and personal regrets. The wrinkle here is that the interrogator is a figment of Maria’s imagination. This is hardly a spoiler, given the journalist is called Mandrax, which is also the name of the Quaaludes-type hypnotic sedative Maria has been ingesting, in increasingly large and alarming doses. When Maria is at home, she’s often at odds with her loyal and protective butler, Ferruccio (Pierfrancesco Favino), and her vigilant housekeeper Bruna (Alba Rohrwacher), whether she’s arguing with them about whether she needs another visit from her doctor (Vincent Maciagne), refusing to eat, or constantly commanding them to move the heavy grand piano from one spot to another.
“Maria” toggles back and forth between that last week in Callas’ life, which includes her attempt to sing once again in a number of rehearsals with a supportive accompanist (Stephen Ashfield), and a number of scenes that play out in Maria’s memory, including triumphant performances at Covent Garden, the Met, et al., and her rocky love affair with the brutish and obscenely wealthy Aristotle Onassis, played by a well-cast Haluk Bilginer. (Thank the heavens, there’s no gimmicky cameo by Portman or any other actress portraying Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis, who remains an offscreen presence.)
This is a crowded film, with director Larraín and the esteemed screenwriter Steven Knight also finding room for flashbacks to Maria’s damaging relationship with her quite terrible mother (Lydia Koniordou), not to mention a splashy fantasy dance number featuring a chorus of tuxedo-clad men performing in front of the Eiffel Tower.
With Larraín and the great cinematographer Edward Lachman (“The Limey,” “Erin Brockovich,” “Far from Heaven”) using vintage lenses and weaving in scenes shot in 35mm, 16mm and Super 8mm, in saturated colors and sometimes black-and-white, “Maria” is a stunning visual feast. The production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas has created an intricately detailed version of Callas’ apartment, while costume designer Massimo Cantini Parrini drapes Jolie in more than 50 gowns and ensembles. (Even when Maria is dressed in the most casual clothes while at home, she looks ready for a Vogue photo shoot.)
Jolie looks breathtaking and fragile, and projects an air of superiority and defiance while allowing us glimpses of Maria’s vulnerability in her final days. The singing here is a synthesized mix of Jolie’s voice with Callas’ recordings, and it’s done seamlessly; we realize that’s not Angelina soloing, especially in the scenes of Callas in her prime, but it never feels like lip-syncing or glamorized karaoke, either. It’s an integral tool of the performance.
At times “Maria” delves into speechifying, as when Callas says that no man, not even the ferociously intimidating Onassis, could ever control her, or when she has an unpleasant encounter with a worshipful but pesky fan outside a Paris café. As was the case with “Jackie” and “Spencer,” this is a film that takes great imaginative leaps of faith yet feels true to the core of what these strong and famous and often misunderstood women endured in their lives. Whether under the glare of the unforgiving spotlight or tucked away in the quiet and the dark, the struggle to be truly seen and heard was a constant.