Korngold - Die tote Stadt / Jan Latham-Koenig - Denoke, Kerl - Opéra de Rhin (1999)
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Anglea Denoke, Barbara Baier, Brigitta Svenden, Torsten Kerl, Yuri BatukovDVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); German (Original Language)
Format: Classical, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.78:1
Running Time: 145 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-01-21
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Arthaus Musik
Movie Reviews of Korngold - Die tote Stadt / Jan Latham-Koenig - Denoke, Kerl - Opéra de Rhin (1999)
Movie Review: Awesome compelling performance 9/5 out of 10!
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this with the CPO Cd's Die Kathrin and Polykrates (which I will review for you later) as a make up and also as I did not have a "visual" interpretation. I have the Naxos CD set and first got to know Korngold's music from the Leinsdorf and the Gerhard (film scores) recordings in the '70's. I have now become a "Korngold tragic", justifiably I believe, he was a real genius and his increasing popularity is endorsing that! You do however have to like late romantic 20th century music, he nearly always sounds modern too at some stage!
Enough background...what do I have to say about this DVD? Well firstly I decided to ignore some of the reviews on here and just pop it in the DVD player and press play...I soon realized that I wanted English sub titles and set that up and then I was glued to my seat until a toilet stop in the 3rd act! After a 10 minute break to do this and that around the house I quickly resumed to the end and then I replayed Mariettas Lied. At the end I concluded it had been a privilege to sit and watch this performance it is awesome. Vocally stunning, the acting especially the tenor unbelievable, and the choir and orchestra divine.
Now to the production and staging, well yes you could dwell on the extreme interpretation but I for one thought with one or two exceptions that it was a compelling visualization and whilst the accompanying booklet gives the usual synopsis the producers variances are not in fact anything more than underlining of those. For instance whilst you think it strange Brigitte sticks a poster of roses to the wall rather than bringing in roses...the poster travels better to the end of the opera as a visual tableau so by the end you understand why a poster and not an awkward bunch!
The obsession with the dead wife is correct and whether it's the doll with the blond hair or the skeletal hand it seemed in character! One other thing, in sound alone I had never been able to work out exactly what happens in the opera and why, and this production finally solved that for me not that you really need to know to understand Korngold's music it just flows like a stream of consciousness and that is sufficient on its own (I told you you had to like late romantic....).
My only quibbles are the poor diction, I think the Swedish Opera set has clearer sung German anyway the subtitles cure that soomewhat. The other quibble was that dream and actual real sequences are not noticeably differentiated and whilst I would kind of liked that, I was also surprised alongside Paul in act 3 as a result of there being no transformation curtain so perhaps it is better this way. Handled differently this could have been a source of titter but it wasn't, you were also genuinely surprised!
One last rave and that's the costumes, lovely, stunning and just one more reason to have this DVD - oh and the sound is very good, almost no audience noise and only one obvious cutout of applause so a tremendous effort by all concerned!
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