Many people, it seems, have been personally attacked by Bradley Cooper. I’m not entirely sure what he’s done to them.
Maybe they were on one of his film sets, where, he recently revealed, he doesn’t allow chairs for people to sit in during down time. That I get. Being seated or, preferably, reclined as often as possible, if not at all times, is incredibly important to me. (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’s Grandpa Joe is a lifelong hero of mine.) But the vitriol that surfaced over the holiday weekend related to Cooper, his new film Maestro, and what appears to be his soul-seizing desire to win an Oscar is outsized to any fair criticisms there are to be made of the movie or his award ambitions.
Cooper stars as legendary conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein in the film, a biopic that centers on his complicated marriage to actress Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan), who he was with until her death—and through several affairs with men and women. It has received mostly positive reviews, with a contingent of ecstatic raves. What already seemed an obvious awards player became a surefire frontrunner in major categories. That would be surprising news if you lurk on its Letterboxd page or in certain corners of social media, where a dislike of the film—or, at least, its presence in the awards race—is growing in volume.
Again, there are plenty of people who are swooning over Maestro and think Cooper deserves to win his first Oscar for it. But these reactions, which seemed to be timed to the film hitting Netflix on Dec. 20, are certainly out of step with those initial, effusive reviews.
So what gives?
Films, especially those with eyes set on gold-plated naked men, seem to now go through several stages of release and reaction, as the industry continues to evolve—and so does the way audiences consume and then vent about discuss them.
There’s a splashy premiere at one of those fancy film festivals, where, drunk off champagne or the excitement to be the first people to see a buzzy movie, reviewers rush to be the first to crown the projects as masterpieces or surefire Oscar contenders. Attached to these typically overenthusiastic reactions is an exhausting arms race to be the audience that gives a movie—any movie, it seems—the longest standing ovation yet. (Given my pre-stated passion for all things sedentary, you can imagine my irritation over this tradition.)
Months later, the plebeians (critics who don’t get to fly to the Croisette to screen a new Martin Scorsese film) see these movies, offering what are often more measured and considered reactions than the festival hype. That’s not the case for every movie; some are still deemed worth the initial fawning. But bear with us.
Then the movie hits streaming, and all bets are off. Social media becomes an unpredictable screaming match of extreme opinions, which can be disarming in its loudness and furor, like watching a fireworks show go off in your living room. Where did these explosives come from? And who set them off?
When Saltburn hit Prime Video, a person risked whiplash by scrolling through social media reactions, with some posters drooling over the film as a twisted, sensual triumph—and others seemingly calling for everyone involved in the project to be charged with war crimes, they had so much vitriol for it. The response when May December hit Netflix was less polarized, with most people rallying around the film’s audacious tone. The surprise of Riverdale alum Charles Melton’s nuanced, devastating performance will likely make him a Cinderella-story Oscar nominee. Yet, at times, it seemed that drowning all of that out was a relentless, confusing conversation about whether or not it appropriately addressed the issue of grooming that… was the very essence of the film.
Now that it’s on Netflix after so many months of festivals and accolades, I think there’s something about Maestro in particular, where the response is rebelling against an assumption that a viewer is supposed to admire it because it has been designated a movie worthy of awards. Everyone has their own taste; it can be exasperating to be told that something that might not be up your alley is automatically deemed “great.” Where’s that attention for the projects and performances you like? That can be especially frustrating when there’s the kind of narrative that surrounds Maestro, where it seems like every element of the film was orchestrated with the express desire to appeal to awards voters and win trophies.
My read: Any sort of “hatred” of the movie is overblown. Like every film, I think it was at least 30 minutes too long. (I thought it ended three different times.) Some of the narrative decisions weren’t necessary, like framing the film around a career retrospective interview. But the movie was a thrill ride. There are some sequences that rank among the most exhilarating of the year, and Cooper and Mulligan are often stunning.
Those accomplishments comprise a remarkable film in my mind, and the fact that it sparks disagreement is maybe one the greatest testaments to its merits. What’s lost—and I wonder if we’ll ever find again—is the ability to conduct (heh) those should-be-rousing discussions with any sort of nuance again.
