Angelina Jolie continues to earn widespread acclaim for her highly anticipated new film, Maria.
The Oscar winner’s portrayal of opera legend Maria Callas received a standing ovation at the Telluride Film Festival on Monday, according to People.
A visibly moved Jolie, 49, covered her mouth and placed a hand on her chest as she expressed her gratitude to the audience, per the outlet.
The Telluride screening comes after Angelina wept during an eight-minute standing ovation the world premiere of Maria at the Venice Film Festival on Thursday.
This comes on the heels of her ex Brad Pitt’s new film Wolfs, costarring George Clooney, which also premiered at Venice but was met with harsh reviews from critics.
During a post-screening panel at Telluride, Jolie reflected on the nerves she felt on her first day singing as Callas on set.
‘I had seven months of opera classes, great teachers and Italian classes, and a supportive team that were going to help me,’ she said, according to People.
‘I was so nervous that morning I was out of my mind.’
The actress also spoke highly of her experience working with director Pablo Larraín, 48, expressing her admiration for their collaboration.
‘I knew that as long as I gave my best, Pablo would be okay with it and somehow make it work.
‘I knew I needed to do my best to try to help solve the puzzle, but I knew that he was a kind person and he was supportive and that helped.’
Meanwhile, Wolfs marks the first time Pitt and Clooney and have shared the screen since 2008’s Burn After Reading.
In this new project, the iconic duo plays fixers who are tasked with covering up crimes, but find themselves reluctantly teaming up when assigned to the same job.
At the premiere, Clooney reflected on his longstanding professional and personal relationship with Pitt.
‘There’s nothing good about it,’ he joked to People. ‘It’s all a disaster.’
On a more serious note, George added, ‘It’s fun to work with people you know really well.’
However, the new buddy-cop film has been eviscerated by critics, who have branded it a one-star ‘messy’ dud and an ‘unbearable comedy.’
Wolfs, the $200 million Apple TV+ film that is set to debut in theaters on September 20, follows the two Ocean’s Eleven costars as they are forced to begrudgingly work together to ‘fix’ a problem that arises when a tough-on-crime DA wakes up with a dead 20-something with whom she was having a one-night stand.
But critics say the movie — which had a record-breaking budget for any streaming film — falls flat, with IGN’s Siddhant Adlakha slamming it as a ‘slick student film from a rich teen who’s subsisted on a media diet of early Guy Ritchie.’
The Guardian’s Xan Brooks also wrote that the ‘joke might be on’ director Jon Watts, who made a fortune off of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Spider-Man trilogy, ‘because what he’s made is basically the film of the meme in which two Spideys point at each other.’
And The Telegraph’s Robbie Collin called the film ‘messy,’ writing: ‘George Clooney recently complained that Quentin Tarantino doesn’t consider him a movie star. If he makes more films like this, Clooney will soon prove Tarantino right.’
He and the other critics say Watts seemed to have banked on Clooney’s and Pitt’s star-status to make it a box office hit, with a lackluster plot and a ‘half-baked script with little humor or heart.’
Barry Levitt, of the Daily Beast, argued that all the jokes surround the single idea that neither character wants to work with the other.
‘Driving along with Clooney and Pitt in Wolfs captures all the thrilling fun of your kids shouting, “Are we there yet?” ad infinitum,’ Levitt writes.
‘It repeats the same joke over and over (and over again). And just when you think Wolfs might be interested in moving onto fresh material, it attempts the same punchline again, in its 400th variation.’
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Source: The Wall Street Journal
