Stars:
**
Rating: Unrated but could
be PG-13 for language and adult sensibilities
Run
Time: 1
hour, 48 minutes. In English and a potpourri of foreign languages sans
subtitles
Fans of
gifted soprano Maria Callas will be weeping into their opera glasses over
Franco Zeffirelli’s tired and campy portrayal of the waning years of the
infamous diva.
Fanny
Ardant is the aging Callas, who has gone into seclusion after a disastrous
Japanese concert that virtually ended her career. Schlocky producer cum Callas friend Larry
Kelly (Jeremy Irons) will have none of her pity party, forcing her out of
retirement by promising her a lip-synced film version of “Carmen”.
Callas
agrees to sell her creative soul to the devil and technology by mounting an
ambitious production of the flashy opera, complete with hunky young co-stars
and a garish set design. Think Ashlee Simpson in a contemporary version of
“Tosca”. But Satan may have something to say about the repercussions of
rediscovering yourself.
Callas is badly crafted filmmaking with a curiously
convivial side. Credit a corny script (“Did Icarus have a second chance?”),
smirky themes regarding the integrity of performance art and overblown
performances by Irons (the definition of pony-tailed cheese) and Ardant, who
plays it moody, melodramatic and sorrowful.
I laughed
repeatedly and in all the wrong places; there’s a saving grace in humor. Zeffirelli
based this homage on his long-term friendship and collaboration with Callas,
who must be spinning in her grave.