A missed opportunity in 2002 that Angelina Jolie waited 22 years to atone for
Angelina Jolie’s most recent great performance was also a fulfilment of a career-long goal, for it seemed for a while that she was doomed to be the most famous actor in the world with the worst filmography.
While she had started her career off strong with an impressive performance in the HBO drama Gia and an Academy Award win for ‘Best Supporting Actress’ for her performance in the James Mangold film Girl, Interrupted, Jolie got into a tough period where nearly all of her films seemed to miss with critics, even if they were more beloved by audiences.
While Jolie became a punching bag because of her weak body of work, the truth is that most of the films perceived to be bad weren’t entirely her fault, as she sadly didn’t get the opportunities that many others in her generation had been offered, strangely enough, for being considered ‘too beautiful’ for certain roles.
Moreover, her lack of standout parts wasn’t because of a lack of trying, as she campaigned to get the lead in the musical adaptation of Chicago, but didn’t end up landing the part, a disappointment that was obvious, as the film instantly became one of the most successful movie musicals of all time, and is partially credited with helping to revitalise the genre in the 21st century.
Even though Moulin Rouge! had been a hit one year earlier, Chicago had to live up to expectations based on how beloved the original Broadway production was, and it also managed to become a surprise frontrunner and eventual winner for the Academy Award for ‘Best Picture’, despite the fact that competitors like The Hours and The Pianist had been considered to be potential frontrunners early on in the season.
The bigger disappointment for Jolie was that she would not be able to sing, as she had come to believe that she had a strong enough voice to sustain such a major part. While the next 22 years sadly didn’t offer her many other opportunities to show off her musical talents, she landed the role of a lifetime when the brilliant director Pablo Larraín cast her to play Maria Callas in the biopic Maria, which was eventually picked up and distributed by Netflix.
It was the third entry in his unorthodox trilogy of biopics about ‘complicated women’, including Natalie Portman as Jackie Kennedy in Jackie and Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana in Spencer, hence expectations for Maria were high. Capturing a voice as singular as Callas’ was always going to be a challenge, as she had reached a register that few singers in the history, or recorded media, were ever able to hit.
However, Jolie did spend seven months training in opera to be able to do as much as she could for the role; in some of the flashback scenes featuring a younger version of Callas, Jolie lip-synced so that the recordings of the real Callas could be added in through editing.
Although her performance was acclaimed, she didn’t end up receiving an Academy Award nomination during a highly competitive year for the ‘Best Actress’ race, which ultimately saw Mikey Madison’s turn in Anora winning over Demi Moore in The Substance. Nonetheless, Maria is a quiet, pensive film about a celebrity artist reflecting on their achievements and mistakes, and in that sense, it feels like the most personal film that Jolie has ever starred in.
