Want to hear more from the actors and creators of your favorite shows and films? Subscribe to The Cinema Spot on YouTube for all of our upcoming interviews!
Lead Critic for the site, as well as serving as an editor when needed.
Many actors try their hand behind the camera, and few of them succeed as established directors. However, Bradley Cooper seems to have finally found his technique behind the lens with his second film. Somehow, he also managed to give his best performance ever while also producing the film and co-writing the film’s screenplay. This year is one in recent memory with many films being biopics based on, or inspired by, true stories, and Maestro tells its story much more subtly than it should have.
With Maestro, Cooper seeks to tell his most interesting and intriguing story yet, while also displaying acting that may finally get him his Oscar. However, Carey Mulligan is the true star of Maestro, performing effortlessly in each scene, and simply taking all the ambiance of the scenario. Cooper’s direction feels more risky than with his first film, yet in a great way. There is a shot early on that nearly blew me away, and the way Cooper moves the camera around everything as he walks through a hallway and then out into a big auditorium is impressive. The camera never cuts away—always following the actor—and then it pulls back to reveal the entire room, simply setting the stage for the type of exposition the audience should feel in each scene involving the Maestro performing.
Minor spoilers to follow.
Juxtaposition, Marriage, & Being Who You Truly Are
Maestro begins with Leonard Bernstein (Cooper), the story’s main character, as an old man, nearly seventy years old, in color, in what is assumed to be the late ’80s. He plays a piece from his opera A Quiet Place while giving an interview. He stops and begins discussing his late wife Felicia Montealegre (Mulligan), the film’s main character.
The audience is then taken back to 1943, in black and white 4:3 ratio, making nearly every scene in this sequence of the film feel like an ode to the Golden Age of Hollywood. Once Maestro has reached Lenny and Felicia in their middle age, the film goes back to color in a typical aspect ratio. This is a fantastic aspect of the film that adds so much more to the on-screen relationship of Felicia and Lenny. The juxtaposition of black and white with color and the ratios of the film during these sequences highlight the difference between Felicia and Leonard during this point in their lives.
More than anything, Maestro paints a fantastic, intoxicating, and complicated portrait of Bernstein and Montealegre’s relationship and marriage. Early on, it was all sunshine and rainbows, and the former seemed to really, really enjoy the latter. Montealegre more than enjoyed his attention and welcomed him home every time they reunited. She also seemed much more accepting, and even tolerable, of Bernstein’s complicated love life. However, by the 70s and 80s, she seems to have grown tired of it, and tired of receiving no attention from her husband, with whom she shares three children.
Bernstein, on the other hand, is having his own internal struggle with how he feels he should be spending his time, and also attempting to create more compositions. It felt as if he was truly scared of not leaving enough great art within the world, but also struggling with his personal and family life. He wanted to conduct great pieces and write amazing music, but couldn’t seem to grasp how to handle this, and how to deal with his personal issues, within himself and his family.
Ultimately, by the 70s and 80s, you can feel the deterioration of their marriage and their struggles. If the film could take a side, Bradley Cooper and Josh Singer’s screenplay makes the film pick Montealegre’s because ultimately she was Bernstein’s reason to live and to be kind. She was also part of his internal conflict and made him want to be a better man, but like everyone, he had his own internal struggles.
However, when Montealegre is diagnosed with cancer, they reunite and Bernstein cares for her until she dies in 1978. He maintained relationships with men until he died in 1990. The sequences that fill in the gaps between Felicia’s death and the film’s end can feel dragged on at times, unfortunately. Although, they also do feel the need to be present because it shows Bernstein being true to himself, albeit a little late in life. Bradley Cooper has repeatedly called Bernstein punk rock throughout the interview circuit, and if any one composer deserves that title, it is truly Leonard Bernstein.
Mahler’s Second
Every type of artist has their top-tier performance or some version they aspire to make their own, having already been done by another great before. Leonard Bernstein’s 1973 conduction of Mahler’s Symphony Number 2, the Resurrection Symphony, is hailed as the best performance of his career. The YouTube version doesn’t do it justice either, but Bradley Cooper exhausts himself in this sequence alone. Cooper performs the scene with such ease and care, while also absolutely commanding the orchestra with every move. It is truly one of the best sequences of the year.
The camera pulls back to Montealegre watching the tail end of the performance, and immediately after it’s over, as he did early in their relationship, Lenny embraces her, in an awe-inspiring moment of Maestro. Here you can sense the ease their relationship is at in this stage of their lives, and there is almost a moment of peace and clarity between the two amongst the chaos of this amazing performance everyone just witnessed. This scene is the true pinnacle of their story and seems to bring everything full circle, with a display of true dedication to their art by Cooper and Mulligan.
Technicalities
Bradley Cooper reteams with cinematographer Matthew Libatique (Requiem for a Dream, Phone Booth, Black Swan, A Star Is Born, The Whale) from his directorial debut. Together, they have crafted my favorite cinematography of the year. The black and white 4:3 shots are so pristine and careful. They are oftentimes slow-moving but similar to something that Sean Durkin’s The Iron Claw does, these shots are still and everlasting. The camera moves when it needs to, and it has its own clear voice. The camera seeks to tell its own story whenever there are not many moving pieces of the scene happening.
Michelle Tesoro’s editing is also extremely smooth and gives the film the extra piece it needs to keep moving. Much of the editing is done during story transitions, another small ode to Golden Age Hollywood, and the editing here is crisp and helps the direction flow in the right direction. Cooper’s decision to use Leonard Bernstein’s own music for the film’s soundtrack was the proper choice. During the scene’s quieter moments, his music fills the scene’s ambiance and keeps reminding the audience of the subject at hand. Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg also serve as producers on Maestro.
Anecdotally, after the film’s first trailer, much conversation was had around Cooper’s look to become Bernstein and the use of prosthetics. The prosthetics makeup, by Vivian Baker, with design by Kazu Hiro, gives the characters more life. Felicia and Leonard, especially, look great and it helps their performances more than anything.
Final Thoughts on Maestro
Maestro is Bradley Cooper displaying the best acting of his career. Alongside him, Carey Mulligan absolutely steals every scene and the duo is the best part of the film. Ultimately, Cooper and Singer’s script focuses a bit too much on character work and dialogue rather than crafting the best love story possible. There is more character exposition rather than story and plot exposition. However, this doesn’t downplay the film all that much. The writers have still crafted a fantastic portrait of two complicated artists who continually wanted more from the other. Montealegre and Bernstein loved each other deeply but felt conflicts throughout life that hurt—rather than helped—their relationship. Think of Maestro as a more complicated and needy love story akin to La La Land, but the couple wanted so much more than Mia and Sebastian.
Maestro also continues this year’s streak of films that craft great stories with astonishing sequences that can bring the audience to tears. The Mahler’s Second sequence is one of the best parts of Maestro and of the year. Cooper’s film is perhaps one of the most impressive sophomore efforts ever, and it would have been amazing to see this film on a big screen. The final shot is also fantastic to ponder and helps the audience answer the question of Montealegre’s importance to Bernstein (and the film’s story): very much so.
4.5/5 stars.
Bradley Cooper’s Maestro is now streaming on Netflix!
For reviews on the year’s few final films, and our best of, do not forget to follow The Cinema Spot on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram!
Lead Critic for the site, as well as serving as an editor when needed.
