Strauss - Elektra
|
List Price: Our Price: $14.31 You Save: $15.67 (52%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Strauss - Elektra
Movie Review: Elektra
Summary: 5 Stars
Phenomenal DVD! I've watched it 3 times since purchasing. I'm mesmerized by Nilsson's singing and acting...at age 62 in this performance. It's a real testament to her talent and abilities. Definitely glad I bought this. Should be in every opera lover's collection.Movie Review: Flawless and beautiful Elektra
Summary: 5 Stars
Thank you very much to the Met for this beautiful production, specially for the amazing Nilsson and his partner the incomparable Rysanek. You will enjoy every moment and every note.Movie Review: GREAT THEATE
Summary: 4 Stars
Both Nilsson and Rysanek (sick and with high fever) are not in their prime, but WHAT a great piece of THEATRE! Nilsson's involvment in this role is overwhelming too such a degree that you can ignore that her voice sounds a bit worn. The public roars - and rightly so. If you want to experience Nilsson as one of the truly great actors of the operatic scene, buy this DVD at once. I was deeply moved and cried at the end.
Movie Review: I wish it had been better
Summary: 3 Stars
For me, Strauss' tale of ghastly family dysfunction has always been an opera better heard on record than seen in the opera house. Its hysterical atmosphere and bizarre characters, while providing tremendous opportunities for singers to display their power, range and stamina, also seem to encourage overacting and hamhanded emoting. Such is the case here. Mignon Dunn as Clytemnestra is the least offensive and actually delivers some truly beautiful singing. But soprano Rysanek whose histrionic skills--for reasons completely unclear to me--were considered non-pareil delivers another ourtrageous performance with excesses that seem based on the worst excesses of the silent screen era. Donald MacIntyre as Orest sings decently but visually is just ridiculous. Nilsson is past her vocal prime but at least does not embarass herself as do her colleagues. To her credit she underplays much of her role allowing the fevered music to make all of the necessary points. Even so, without the benefit of aesthetic distance, the viewer can see a certain calculatedness to her movements, a quality that belies the out-of-control emotionalism that she is trying to portray. The star of this show is Levine whose conducting is all that that one could wish for. As I suggested earlier, there are certain operas that call for physical acting skills that are just beyond the abilities of the average and even great singer. Watch Renee Fleming's Blanche DuBois in Previn's "Streetcar Named Desire" for a recent example. While vocally they can be quite pleasing and even thrilling, the talent to translate their musical gifts into believable behavioral action is not always theirs to command. Unfortunately, I feel that many of we opera fans have learned to settle for and accept second rate and really rather silly exibitions as examples of great art. No wonder Callas seemed so revolutionary.
Movie Review: Nilsson's dramatic acting makes the best of things
Summary: 3 Stars
This is a February 1980 live performance from the Met, with optional English subtitles.
The staging is the rather traditional and appropriate cavelike or dungeon setting. Costumes for Elektra (Birgit Nilsson) and her sister Chrisothemis (Leonie Rysanek) are also bland, which is probably also appropriate for those who have been held prisoner for some years. Klytemnestra, Elektra's mother (Mignon Dunn) wears the very colorful vestiments befitting a self-indulgent queen.
Now comes the hard part: I found Birgit Nilsson's voice to be at times wobbly and sometimes shrieking. It might be a personal preference, as the character Elektra certainly has a lot to shriek about. And yes, it was a live performance, near the end of Nilsson's career, but the DVD notes do proclaim "her vocal powers are as glorious as ever." Personally, I was disappointed in what sounded like inconsistent singing.
On the other hand, her dramatic powers were impressive. Nilsson was totally involved throughout the entire opera, and her gestures and facial reactions to the other characters added tremendously to the overall impact. We should remember that she was a pioneer between the time when opera singers tended to stand stiffly and sing, into today's era where we expect acting and reacting which the camera's eye allows us to see.
This performance features an extremely dramatic finale where Nilsson and Rysanek both collapse and die--it is dramatic and moving, and brings down the house at the Met.
More Movie Reviews:
1 2
1 2