Angelina Jolie said that she "really came to care for" Maria Callas, the opera singer she portrays in Maria, which she promoted at the Venice Film Festival Thursday.

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"Honestly, for me, the bar in this, that I would know if I did good enough, are the Maria Callas fans and those who love opera," Jolie said in a presser. "And my fear would be to disappoint them."

Callas died in 1977 when she was 53, and the film examines the latter part of her life in Paris.

"Maria is a creative imagining and a psychological portrait of Maria Callas," an official synopsis says. "...A story about a woman that lived from the '20s to '70s, a woman who burned her voice, her life, by doing (what she loved) her work."

Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders) wrote the movie.

Jolie wore a long, slim-fitting black dress, adorned by a single brooch, to the photo call.

"I felt I didn't want to do a disservice to this woman," she said.