MovieChat Forums > Amadeus (1984) Discussion > That laugh and the accents

That laugh and the accents

posted 9 years ago by paul-273-129025
16 replies | jump to latest

Just watched this film (Directors Cut) for the first time. I thought it was a really good film but I didn't really understand why they made Mozart such a joke figure. Why the ridiculous laugh? It was quite annoying. I can only think it was to make us side more with Saltieri in his dislike of Mozart.

Also I know that the real life characters did not use English as a main language if at all but I found the American accents off putting. It spoiled the illusion of the setting for me. I know English accents should have done that too but they seem more suited to me and the Emperor came across better.

[–] 9 years ago

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[–] paul-273-129025 9 years ago

Excellent video. Thanks

[–] Sugarminx 9 years ago

I'm not sure why Mozart was so silly in this movie

Because Salieri is recounting the story, it is being told from his POV. A man who didn't like Mozart. It seems pretty clear to me that he'd exaggerate Mozart's annoying habits...We can't know what Mozart (in this fictionalised world) was really like, we can only rely on the information given to us by someone who had an agenda.

So put some spice in my sauce, honey in my tea, an ace up my sleeve and a slinkyplanb

[–] paul-273-129025 9 years ago

Ermmmm......ok right.

[–] sc_taylor 9 years ago

Well Mozart was certainly a practical joker and enjoyed scatological humour. So it may not have been far off the truth!

[–] snsurone 9 years ago

The brilliance of Tom Hulce's performance was that while Mozart was an annoying ass early in the story, as time went by he gradually developed into a sensitive and sympathetic person.
His problems with his marriage, his father, and Salieri's blacklisting of his work forced him to grow up, and it made his death all the more tragic.

[–] sesquick-seabag 9 years ago

I love the laugh Hulce did. There are some accounts that Mozart had an silly-sounding giggle. The point of emphasising it in the film/play is it would seem to emphasise Salieri's disbelief that the true musical genius, the voice of God, behaves like an "obscene child".

Jeffrey Jones's accent (as the emperor) was 100% American though. I listened to the DVD commentary (with Forman and Schaffer speaking) and Forman says his idea was that the authority figures would speak with British accent (specifically upper-class English accents) while everyone else is represented by American accents (including Simon Callow). But Jones sounds American (if he was trying to affect an English accent he failed) and Patrick Hines (an American actor playing Kapellmeister Bono) used an Italian accent. Accents are just all over the place in this film. Yet - and don't ask me why - I'm not bothered by it when I watch this, even though I usually am bothered by such things.

[–] daniela_atmad 9 years ago

Mozart was thought to have a distinctive annoying laugh in real life, and this added to his silly vile nature, making it more questionable why God have his voice to such a man.

As for the accents, the director also did not want to waste time on actors perfecting their accents, he preferred them to focus on their actual portrayal of the characters more. And if you watch Immortal Beloved, the movie about Beethoven, the actors actually speak with German accents which I find are insanely annoying and distracting from the actual performance.
That movie is terrible compared to Amadeus by the way.

Amadeus is a masterpiece.

[–] Robbmonster 9 years ago

Mozart was well noted for having an extremely annoying laugh. Some one wrote in a letter at the time something to the effect it sounded like a knife scrapping across glass.

So if the laugh was annoying... mission accomplished.

Never defend crap with 'It's just a movie'
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[–] 9 years ago

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