I hope that Bradley Cooper will win an Oscar soon.
It’s obvious that Cooper wants that Oscar and really, who can blame him? After spending years being dismissed as a lightweight comedy actor, Cooper has really come into his own over the past thirteen years. 2012 was the year that he starred in Silver Linings Playbook and received his first Best Actor nomination. In the years that followed, he was nominated for American Sniper, American Hustle, A Star Is Born and Maestro. He deserved to be nominated for both Nightmare Alley and Licorice Pizza. Cooper has shown himself to be both a talented actor and director. He may not have been nominated for his direction of A Star Is Born but everyone knows that he should have been. He’s come a long way from being the star of The Hangover films and it makes sense that he would want an Oscar to make it official.
(The Oscar itself may not carry the cultural cachet that it once did but seriously, an award is an award.)
That desire for an Oscar is probably the best way to explain 2023’s Maestro, a film that really might as well have just been called Oscar Bait. Not only did Cooper direct and co-write Maestro but he also donned a prosthetic nose (and was briefly the center of some online controversy) to play the role of composer Leonard Bernstein. Filmed in both black-and-white and color, the film follows Leonard Bernstein from his young debut as a conductor through his marriage to Felecia (Carey Mulligan). Throughout the film, Felecia remains Leonard’s strongest supporter and his muse, even when she’s embarrassed by the rumors of his own impulsive behavior and his habit of cheating on her with men. The film is a portrait of the struggle to be a genius, the struggle to support a genius, and the love that can hold two people together even during the most difficult of times. And it’s all very Oscar bait-y, giving both Bradley Cooper and Carey Mulligan several scenes that, while well-executed, still feel as if they were designed specifically to appeal to the voters.
I had mixed feelings about Maestro when I watched it. On the one hand, I definitely admired the craft and the skill that went into the production. I admired the performances of both Bradley Cooper and Carey Mulligan. The movie’s soundtrack is full of the best of Bernstein’s compositions, all performed by the London Symphony Orchestra. The movie looked wonderful and it sounded wonderful but it also felt strangely hollow. Watching it, I realized that the movie really didn’t know what it wanted to say about Bernstein and Felecia. The movie was so consumed with technical perfection that the emotions of the story sometimes felt rather remote. It was a film about Leonard Bernstein that, despite Cooper’s strong performance, failed to really give us a reason to care about Bernstein. Maestro is a film that you admire while you watch it but it doesn’t really stick with you afterwards. It’s the epitome of Oscar bait.
Maestro did not win Cooper any Oscars, though it did bring some nominations. The film was also nominated for Best Picture but it lost to Oppenheimer. That said, I’m looking forward to the year when Bradley Cooper does finally win his Oscar and hopefully, he’ll win it for a film that’s more like the emotion-filled A Star Is Born than the rather detached Maestro. He’s one of my favorite actors and he’s due.
Through the Shattered Lens 