Film Review: Angelo Shows Us That We Are Still Learning About Racial Sensitivity
By: Abygai Peña
After seven years, Markus Schleinzer follows his debut feature Michael with the long-awaited Angelo a biopic about African slave Angelo Soliman a child selected by an 18th-century comtesse (Alba Rohrwacher) and educated as a Viennese court entertainer. Schleinzer’s film recounts Soliman’s journey as a black man who must navigate 18th century high society.
Cinematically, Angelo Soliman’s story chronicles sections of his lifetime showing off what is the most striking part of this film: the wardrobe and set design. Meticulous and with incredible attention to detail the Wardrobe Department adorns Angelo in the most lavish attire throughout the film which helps illustrate and contextualize his rank in society. At the height of his career as a Court Entertainer, Angelo is literally star-studded in a cloak of gems and rhinestone. This cloak returns later in his life after a secret marriage to a white woman leaves him out of favor with the Viennese aristocracy. Soliman tears apart his blazing red cloak and selling the gems to support his family after his expulsion from the court.Soliman takes this adversity with a quiet calm. Variety’s Guy Lodge calls “Markus Schleinzer's second feature is formally stunning and politically seething.” Lodge references Soliman’s expectation to act as entertainment, not human.
In fact, Angelo has received much praise for its strong and silent portrayal of Soliman. With Screendaily applauding Schleinzer’s character development, “Schleinzer, like his central character, uses silence as a tool and a weapon.” Schleinzer’s frigid rendering of Angelo Soliman a man who rose the ranks of high society as an intellectual, as a man who became the Grand Master of his Freemason lodge, and as a man who was well-respected for his forward thinking makes hardly any sense.
Keith Moore, author of Freemasonry, Greek Philosophy, the Prince Hall Fraternity and the Egyptian (African) World Connection, acknowledges Soliman as an asset to Europe’s 18th century Freemason practice as he contributed to redefining Freemasonry as a scholarly ritual and still holds regard as the “Father of Pure Masonic Thought.” It is unlikely that Soliman was as hushed and surly as the film suggests. “Silence as a tool and a weapon” is dismissive to an audience that relates to the pain of being silenced. To infer that silence was a choice for Angelo Soliman shows a disregard for his lived experience as the only black person in Viennese court. Schleinzer’s voiceless representation of Angelo Soliman speaks to the dismissal of black intellectualism. When does a main character with plenty to express about his situation end up with the least amount of lines in a narrative? Angelo’s mute portrayal proves sophomoric, indeed.