@@Wonka89- Very well said, I wholeheartedly agree with you. To me movies during this time felt more mature in regards to storytelling. There was world & character building.
One thing I realised re-watching this scene: In the actual opera the servant couple are the good guys while the male part of the aristocratic couple is the villain. While describing the 20 minute scene, Mozart cleverly disguises that. He talks about a regular couple having an argument and a “scheming little maid comes in”. In fact maid is scheming with the Countess against the Count himself who wants to rape her. And later he describes Figaro (who is actually the good guy trying to stop the Count) as husband’s valet who is “plotting with the maid”. So he is using the language of the emperor and aristocracy against the poor people to convince them (and Hulce ever so slightly makes this belittling face when he utters those phrases). The actual opera is much more symphetatic to the maid and the valet. Found this little detail interesting because it goes against the surface level interpretation that Mozart is depicted as this naive, childish guy who doesn't understand the political situation around him. He actually very well does and manipulates it for his advantage.
This film is spectacular in many ways except the biographical aspect, which we all know is very wrong. According to David Cairns, it was Lorenzo da Ponte, the librettist, who actually released Le Nozze from censorship. The operatic language of the aristocracy was serious opera, like Idomeneo. And she is exactly the one criticized in the famous passage: Oh, bello, bello, bello! Come on now, be honest. Wouldn't you all rather listen to your hairdressers than Hercules? Or Horatius? Or Orpheus? All those old bores! People so lofty they sound as if they shit marble! It was the opera buffa librettos created by Carlo Goldoni that put the conflict between aristocratic and bourgeois morals in conflict on stage. To understand this scene, it is worth reading the book by Norbert Elias, Mozart Sociology of a genius, in particular the chapter “Craftsman's art, Artist's art”.
@@historiasdamusica Nevertheless, Mozart chose this libretto to write music to. He knew it was damning of the aristocracy. This is the late 18th Century. The world is transforming into the one we recognize today. The Marriage of Figaro is a modern opera. Without the heavenly music, the libretto would have gotten nowhere.
"Why must we go on forever, writing only about gods and legends??" "Because they do! They go on forever! At least what they represent." The writing is just phenomenal
I just love that for a period of history, the top political leaders took their artistic output as seriously as any other part of their governing. It's my understanding that it was Mozart's librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte, who convinced the emperor to allow the production of the operatic version of Figaro. Here in modern times, government officials will get riled up now and then about a piece of music or art; usually because they find something offensive. But back in the late 1700's, artistic output was how a country was defined. It was a statement to cultural sophistication and a commentary on the populace.
That's true: it was da Ponde who convinced the emperor to lift the censurchip. But not every aristocrat took art as serious as politics. And art was used not for arts's sake, it was a projection of power and wealth. You should read Nobert Elias book,The Court Society. And it's not true that art was how a country was defined. The wish of God was the justification for absolutists monarchies. And aristocrats could spent their times with art because all the privileges they have. They own the land, because God said so, and they could colect taxes on it. Hail, hail, french revolution!!
This is one of my favorite scenes in the movie, and if not in all movies. Every character plays his part perfectly. Nothing is wasted or empty. Not one character is a hollow stereotype. And what of my favorite lines is uttered by one of the minor characters, Baron von Swieten: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart : I am fed to the teeth with elevated themes! Old dead legends! Why must we go on forever writing about gods and legends? Baron Van Swieten : Because they do. They go on forever. Or at least what they represent. The eternal in us. Opera is here to ennoble us. You and me, just the same as His Majesty.
@@carolme77 There's no evidence that Mozart laughed like that. The movie's depiction of him is mostly fictional, although he did have a notable fondness for fart-jokes and other bathroom humor, irl.
I like that they don't portray the emperor as a fool. You don't have to agree with him, but he comes across throughout the film as a reasonable man. Portraying him as a complete fool would have been only too easy. He's still portrayed as being "wrong" in some ways, but he is portrayed as a real person with both virtues and failings. Every character was written so well.
What a brilliant scene and very well acted, worthy of analysis (as the whole movie), Mozart (in the movie) just wanted to tell a story with ordinary people that the public could relate to and laugh, I have nothing against legends or myths (which would be the movies of science fiction and fantasy of our times), the theme was subversive, but the author is just taking the theme, it was not so much a protest, comedy is taking a matter of life with laughter. I really like Mozart's comparing the difference between noise and music, but that noise can be harmonious, it can be transformed into music, in fact that's the basis of Music as a whole. Many artists have had to fight against censorship to show their vision to those who only want to maintain their interests and their elitist status, still happens today.
Not to criticize the film but Mozart was by far not so silly in such company, but it makes a good character. He grew up playing for high society and royalty.
@@Meme_God_Killer By every ordinary metric, he is a genius. Would you like to compare his accomplishments? If you do not know of any, then you may wish to: 1- question the media you use, 2- use a search engine to discover his accomplishment . 3- find out why others view him as a genius and challenge your own opinion in the vacuum of knowledge of those accomplishments. Or you could blissfully continue onwards because its no fun to discover a cherished belief is wrong.
@@frankstrawnation está legendado, é o título do vídeo está em português, só isso já séria o bastante pra pessoas do Brasil entenderem o vídeo. É dublado seria difícil pois o filme em si não existe dublagem, outro fator que mostra o quão esse país não se importa tanto com tal conteúdo.
Phenomenal acting on the part of the king in this scene. You can just see the layers of carefully covered thoughts. Does someone remember the actor's name? In my family we just call him Rooney. . . 😆
As far as I'm concerned, this is inaccurate. Acording to some sources (Britannica Enciclopedia, Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians), the opera's librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte (who was the official court's poet too), asked the emperor Joseph permission to transform this play into an opera, without the political connotation the original work has. Although the theatrical play was actually banned, the emperor allowed Da Ponte to do the opera, without even hearing the music. Still, I love this movie very much
More films set in Europe should use the American accents, among others. It's what made this film so successful. The King has an American accent in this film, but why shouldn't it be Canadian, Australian, or Kiwi?
@.Lawrence. He persuaded the Emperor to let the Opera go ahead. It is still performed nowadays at Opera Houses all over the world. The Marriage of Figaro.
Well he wrote that Opera in Italian. One of the biographies I read said he was studying English and reading Shakepeare before he died. Don't know if that's true
“I’m a vulgar man! But I can assure you, my music is not” *lol that’s not completely true. Mozart was known for his restroom humor to the point where he once wrote a humorous rhyme about it. There’s a whole Wikipedia page of “Mozart and scatology” 🤣✋
@@jean6872 mozart was also a clown.... a court jester.. a slave to the music industry, after working 20 years for merely nothing, even though his artwork was great. Hey, but life is a total joke in society.... yeah fool Kayne West is starting to realize this... the same fate that Mozart had 300 years before
Apparently the real Mozart had an irritating high-pitched nervous laugh. People who knew him described it like scratching glass. He was a childish and immature man who laughed at everything.
@Rachel L *_I wonder how true it is to say that Mozart was a childish immature man and whether this belief is based on reality or the gossip of his enemies._*
