1. The rival of Mozart in the movie is Antonio Salieri, a court composer for Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II.
2. Like many of the "enlightened despots" of his time, Joseph was a lover and patron of the arts and is remembered as such. He was known as the "Musical King" and steered Austrian high culture towards a more Germanic orientation. He commissioned the German-language opera Die Entführung aus dem Serail from Mozart.
3. Mozart’s wife was Constanze, a third daughter of Webers family, whom Mozart moved in with in Vienna.
4. Leopold Mozart, a native of Augsburg, was a minor composer and an experienced teacher. His relations with son were quite bad: they had many disputes, for example, about Wolfgang’s intends to resign from service to Archbishop Colloredo and marry Constanze. He criticized his son’s lifestyle and tried to control him.
5. The emperor liked Mozart’s first performance and expressed his respect to a talented musician and composer, but he noticed that Mozart’s music had a little too many notes, in other words, he found the music too hard for the perception of an ordinary man.
6. Many works of Mozart are featured in the movie: Le Nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro), K492, Act IV, Ah Tutti Contenti (1786), Don Giovanni, K527, A Cenar Teco, Da Qual Tremore Insolito (1787), Die Entführung aus dem Serail (Abduction from the Seraglio), K384, Marten Aller Arten (1782), Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute), K620, Aria No. 14, Der Holle Rache Kocht (1791), Concerto for Piano in E Flat Major, K482, 3rd Movement, Allegro
(1782-86), Concerto for Piano in D Minor, K466 (1782-86), Symphony No. 25 in G Minor, K183: 1st Movement (1773), Lacrimosa, Requiem Mass in D, K626, Adagio and Rondo for Glass Harmonica, Flute, Oboe, Viola and Cello, K617 (1791), Confutatis, Requiem Mass in D, K 626 and others. It is a good representation of Mozart’s musical output as for 180 minutes of the movie.
7. In the movie, Mozart died of sickness that followed his poor lifestyle combined with hard drinking. He dies in the morning in presence of his wife, his son and Sallieri after spending the night dictating passages of Requiem to Sallieri. In reality, he became bedridden on 20 November and died on 5 December.
8. In reality, Count Franz von Walsegg wanted to anonymously commission the piece for a Requiem Mass to commemorate the February 14 anniversary of his wife's death. This plan was frustrated by a public benefit performance for Mozart's widow Constanze. In the movie, Sallieri wanted to commission it, but Constanze did not allow it and took the notes.
9. In the movie, Requiem was not finished and its further destiny is unknown. In reality, Requiem was finished by Mozart’s student, Franx Xaver Sussmayr.
10. In the movie Mozart was buried in a pauper’s mass grave. In reality, he was buried in a “common grave”, it was an individual grave, but for a common man, not an aristocracy.
11. The story told in the movie is fictional, and Sallieri is depicted untruthfully. In reality, he was a more known and respected than Mozart. In reality, Requiem was ordered in the summer, but not in winter. In the movie, Mozart has only one child, but there were six of them, though only two survived. In one of the scenes Mozart speaks contemptuously of works of Gluck and Handel, but in reality they were his favorite composers. Mozart is shown very infantile and silly, and I think that this portrayal is totally wrong.
