The film Amadeus, directed by Miloš Forman, showcases a stylized adaptation of the life of history’s most well-known and beloved musical composer, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The plot begins with the establishment of the fictionalized protagonist, Antonio Salieri, as an old man, and his firm belief that he was the one who killed Mozart. Having attempted taking his own life, he was forced into a mental asylum, where in his confession to a priest he recounts his history with Mozart. All throughout his life, Salieri had been driven by one driving desire: to serve God through music. Salieri makes a comparison of his early life in parallel to young Mozart, who was a child prodigy, and establishes the theme of rivalry and competition. Years later when
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In the early years of his life, Salieri was a devoted and pious man dedicated to being the “instrument of God”, but upon meeting Mozart, whose fresh and intriguing approach to music demeaned his efforts, left Salieri building up doubt and later cynicism towards God and faith in general. Salieri’s rivalry with Mozart stemmed from his disgruntled relationship with God due to the fact that he believed that God was mocking him through the great composer himself. It reached the point where Salieri believed that the only way to triumph in this struggle was to become Mozart himself, or to claim his work as his own, and rid himself of the mockery by killing Mozart. A phenomenon of a similar principle was taking place in Europe at the time. Through the discovery of new information and the rising precedence of provable research, belief in the accuracy of religious texts dwindled. Like Mozart, a new and contemporary style of thinking was quickly replacing the old religious based system that was bogged down by tradition and out-dated beliefs, which represents the struggle Salieri had in keeping up with the forthcoming genius of Mozart. The rivalry between the protagonists firmly established the idea that forthcoming modernized thinking of the Enlightenment played a large factor in creating secular components of
In the early years of his life, Salieri was a devoted and pious man dedicated to being the “instrument of God”, but upon meeting Mozart, whose fresh and intriguing approach to music demeaned his efforts, left Salieri building up doubt and later cynicism towards God and faith in general. Salieri’s rivalry with Mozart stemmed from his disgruntled relationship with God due to the fact that he believed that God was mocking him through the great composer himself. It reached the point where Salieri believed that the only way to triumph in this struggle was to become Mozart himself, or to claim his work as his own, and rid himself of the mockery by killing Mozart. A phenomenon of a similar principle was taking place in Europe at the time. Through the discovery of new information and the rising precedence of provable research, belief in the accuracy of religious texts dwindled. Like Mozart, a new and contemporary style of thinking was quickly replacing the old religious based system that was bogged down by tradition and out-dated beliefs, which represents the struggle Salieri had in keeping up with the forthcoming genius of Mozart. The rivalry between the protagonists firmly established the idea that forthcoming modernized thinking of the Enlightenment played a large factor in creating secular components of