Music and melodrama - a classic combination

Rating: 10/10 (31 May 2005)

AMADEUS: DIRECTOR'S CUT
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (Panavision)
Sound format: Dolby Digital
Many years after the death of Mozart (Tom Hulce), the aged and embittered court composer Salieri (F. Murray Abraham) relates to a disbelieving priest the story of his obsession with Mozart's musical genius and how it led to jealousy, betrayal, and possibly even murder...
Sumptuous evocation of a time and place, using Mozart's glorious music both to propel the story and underline the emotional dynamics of Peter Shaffer's extraordinary script. Based on his well-received stage play, and completely reworked for the screen, AMADEUS (1984) - and its updated version, reviewed here as AMADEUS: DIRECTOR'S CUT, released in 2001 - portrays Mozart's world as a romantic marriage of Royal palaces and candle-lit garrets, populated by eccentric emperors and their devious, toadying lackeys. The composer himself is played by Hulce as a spoiled, egotistical brat who indulges his passion for earthly pleasures with all the enthusiasm he brings to his musical compositions. But the film is anchored by Abraham in an Oscar-winning turn as Mozart's nemesis Salieri, consumed by envy and hatred whilst simultaneously awed by his rival's genius, the genius which Salieri had wished for himself, only to be denied by a mischievous God. The scenes in his asylum cell - where the elder Salieri confesses his 'crime' to a naive priest (Richard Frank) - are a tour de force, played with an intensity that simply burns up the screen. Beautifully designed and photographed, and bolstered by a magnificent supporting cast (including Jeffrey Jones, Simon Callow and Kenneth McMillan in a role completely excised from the original theatrical print), the movie unfolds like an operatic melodrama which builds to a shattering climax, as the two central characters reach an understanding (of sorts) during the writing of Mozart's 'Requiem', only to be divided forever by unexpected tragedy. A masterpiece.
The director's cut runs 180 minutes (the original theatrical version ran 160m) and reinstates various bits and pieces which help to clarify a number of crucial plot developments (the antagonism between Salieri and Mozart's wife is more fully explained, for example). Incredibly, the MPAA gave the film an R-rating for a brief sequence in which a female character bares her breasts to the camera! There's nothing here which warrants anything more than a PG-13.
NB. The original version was released theatrically in 35mm and 70mm editions, featuring a 6-track Dolby Stereo soundtrack.