Amos Bardi was born with a serious condition in both eyes which eventually led him to being blind as a child. Because of a perceptive music teacher in his school for the blind, Amos's love of opera singing was nurtured and his own talent in singing was discovered, boosting his self-confidence. As a college student, he became a singer at a piano bar, which led him to meet his future wife. Later, he would be inspired to take up singing opera seriously under the guidance of an esteemed maestro.
I went to watch this movie because I assumed it would be about music. However, I never thought I would actually be watching the life story of one of my favorite singers of all time -- Andrea Bocelli. It was unusual that the filmmakers chose to give the lead character another name Amos Bardi, when this film was obviously about Bocelli. The screenplay was adapted from Bocelli's own 1999 autobiography, but are we to assume that some parts of the film may not have been completely true to Bocelli's actual life story?
English actor Toby Sebastian played the lead character Amos Bardi. He certainly tried his best to look and act like Andrea Bocelli, nailing his facial mannerisms while singing. The beautiful Italian actress Luisa Ranieri played Amos's mother, Edi. Spanish actor Jordi Molla played his father, Sandro, who had one very moving scene after leaving Amos at his boarding school. Nadir Casselli played Amos' supportive wife Ellonora. Antonio Banderas as the strict Maestro who elevated the quality of Amos' singing with his exacting rules of discipline of silence.
All the known facts about Andrea Bocelli were in there. He was born with congenital glaucoma. He completely lost his eyesight in a soccer accident at age 12. He sang "Miserere" with rock singer Zucchero in 1993 and became an overnight superstar. The difficulties and heartaches he experienced growing up as a child and as a singer filled up the rest of the nearly two hours of running time.
I found some of this new information very interesting to know, like let's say, that he actually completed a degree in Law. But some other events were rather mundane, episodic, and yes, boring. I think part of the problem was the decision to write the script into English, instead of the more authentic Italian language, the mother tongue of most of the actors, making many of those scenes sound somewhat stilted.
Anyhow, for fans of opera and Bocelli like me, none of that was a major problem. I found this biopic directed by Michael Radford (best known for writing and directing "Il Postino" in 1994) quite engaging in general, with only a few rough patches along the way. The beautiful singing featured in the film, both by Bocelli (for adult Amos) and the boy soprano (for child Amos) whose heavenly voices we hear in the soundtrack, made the film well-worth the time spent to watch it. 7/10.
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