Movie Details
| Title: | Maestro | |
| Director: | Bradley Cooper | |
| Year: | 2023 | |
| Genre: | Biopic | |
| Times Seen: | 1 | |
| Last Seen: | 01.01.24 |
Other Movies Seen By This Director (1)
- A Star is Born
| Date Viewed | Venue | Note |
| 01.01.24 | Internet | Bringing in the new year with another oscar movie. This one I think I actually liked more than the imdb ratings suggest. Yes it's a biopic which I typically don't love, and it's about a figure that doesn't hold particular interest for me, but I liked that Cooper clearly wanted to showcase Carey Mulligan's performance as much as he could. Typically the wives of all these biopic subjects are just kinda there or serve as nothing more than a moral compass. I think you could describe Mulligan's part that way too, but the performance itself is good enough to set her apart from the others. Cooper's performance is also good and transformative... now that i'm writing this all out, I think I feel the exact same about this movie as I did with Cooper's Star is Born: didn't expect to like it, he transformed into the role, he showcased his leading lady, better than I thought! That said, I shouldn't dismiss the common potholes that most biopics run over. It's a two-hour encapsulation of this guy's life so it feels like we're breezing through like cliff notes just hitting bullet points... while Bernstein's drama is affairs with guys (wiki says women too but the movie doesn't mention that) instead of drugs or mental health, it's still the same exact dramatic arc. The stuff where he creates the music I guess he's known for is never rewarding enough (the montage in the Brian Wilson biopic is the only scene that comes to mind which truly does deliver in that regard), and all this film format switching has become de rigueur but I found it a bit distracting. That said, the cinematography is pretty great, the make-up I thought was really good (in the scene where he's conducting, he's sweating on all that prosthesis and it looks so great), and all the other craft of the film is clearly aimed at oscars. So it's firmly in that category where you can't really say the movie is BAD, it just comes down to whether you like it or not. |
