“Maestro” on Netflix: Bradley Cooper uses a musical genius to win his first Oscar | Review | Review | Leonard Bernstein | Carey Mulligan | Summary | Streaming | Skip – Enter

Like a diligent student, Bradley Cooper He knows how to wait patiently with time, but, above all, train himself in film direction, which seems to interest him above all. Born in Philadelphia 48 years ago “Maestro“The proof of that.

Ten years after starring in the blockbuster movie “Sniper,” based on the eventful life of Chris Kyle, a U.S. Navy SEAL who destroyed 255 targets during the Iraq war — and five years after his directorial debut “He Was Born a Star” (with then-debutant Lady Gaga), His evolution is evident.

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In the Clint Eastwood-directed war film, Cooper plays a boy from Texas who, born with a commitment to protecting others, enlists to serve his country. In between training and his first assignments, Kyle meets Taya (Sienna Miller), who accompanies him in his development to become the nation's record marksman. But all is not well, being subjected to high levels of stress during their campaigns creates terrible effects on their emotional health, effects on their family environment.

The third adaptation of “A Star is Born” has a different tone. Here we are faced with a portrait of two parallel lives that sometimes bring out the best (and worst) in each other. Cooper – Director Debut – Jack Maine, a musician suffering from alcoholism, drug addiction and depression. Gaga is Alli Campana, a cabaret artist who is haunted by her insecurities and far from her dreams of greatness. Until the two meet.

A faithful example of “gunner” Cooper, the beginning, with medium-sized responsibilities (although Eastwood takes it to the limit, the role of a war veteran tormented by his memories is not new to the screen). A film starring Gaga in 2018 is the opposite. We face more than a love story with rock, bands and cowboy hats in the background. The film is a tour through the most subtle and at the same time dark side of humanity: triumph, joy, but also helplessness and pain constantly emerge in its more than two-hour duration.

Almost five years after that directorial debut, Cooper specified “Maestro“A more ambitious, though less commercial, proposal: to bring to the screen the life of Leonard Bernstein, the legendary American musician of Jewish origin. First in conducting an orchestra, then in the relationship between Lenny – the composer, who died in 1990, was known – and his wife, the Chilean-born actress Felicia Conn Montelegre. , the young filmmaker made a series of decisions that would ultimately turn out to be the right ones. . First, the lights together. Second, focus on the specifics. Third – and most important – to draw attention to his partner, Carey Mulligan.

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If signing a script with Josh Singer is already important, having none other than Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese as producers, at least, guarantees the seriousness of the project. On the other hand, if one only has to check Google to discover Bernstein's dozens of achievements as a conductor, Cooper seems to have no problem: she has to prioritize small details connected to her family life, but above all she has to balance between great public presentations and escapades with charming leading men. Personality.

It's not exactly a short film. “Maestro” screened in Netflix December 20 and a few days earlier in select theaters – it crossed the two-hour mark. Without a linear structure, the film begins with an elderly Bernstein giving a television interview in which he examines his beloved wife, Felicia. After a while, everything goes black and white and we flash back to 1943, when Lenny — while sleeping with an occasional lover (David Oppenheim/Matt Bomer) — gets an unexpected phone call: He has to replace the director of the New York Philharmonic.

All the doors open after this first great chance at Carnegie Hall, Bernstein crosses with Felicia, brilliantly played by Carey Mulligan. Director Cooper has succinctly summarized all the stages of love. From falling in love to passion, through complicity and promises, but also through doubts and disappointments.

Even in black and white, the couple doesn't want to hide secrets. The famed “West Side Story” composer's bisexuality initially faced no obstacles. And Felicia's sincerity and understanding are so real that when Lennie escapes to the roof of a meeting with a handsome young man, she is jealous, and the feeling of intimacy is inevitable: How can we imagine this not happening?

But “Maestro” are also dialogues. Some are sensitive and emotional: “You smell like my father. Am I different? As a child I loved wrapping myself in his raincoat when he came home from work at night. The scent mesmerized me. I've always associated it with a sense of security.”. And some, bathed in humanity: “I have two factors that save me. One, I love people and I love music (…) I'm very depressed, but I'm a worker and that keeps me afloat. “I love people so much, I don't know how to be alone.”.

Perhaps more so than a musical film or a biography of a genius like Bernstein.Maestro” is a remarkable play with elements well thought out by its perceptive director. The controversy over Cooper's prosthetic nose quickly falls apart when we see how each character – young Lenny vs. Old Lenny or Young Felicia vs. Felicia, old (and sick)—stands out as unobjectionable. While some scenes seem to take too long (such as the movement of a car from the parking lot of a house), others (when the protagonists sit in a green garden with their backs to each other) their duration is based on the need to portray that mystery. True love endures through a mix of bad and good moments..

Because he surrounds himself with people who are capable of pursuing an ambitious project and whose results are visible. Because he knows exactly what to show and what not to show in a portrait that can become endless. But most of all because he allowed his co-star to illuminate the most difficult and moving moments in history with his talent, “MaestroIt's a great testament to how Bradley Cooper has evolved over the past decade, perhaps turning the veteran into a candidate to win. Co Today it depends.