Change Your Image
mfbix
Reviews
Die Walküre (1993)
The Best Walkure on DVD
To my taste the 1993 Barenboim/Bayreuth Ring is the best of the current commercial video recordings of The Ring, which include as well: 1) the 1985 Bayreuth (Philips DVD), 2) the 1989 Bavarian State Opera (EMI-Toshiba DVD), 3) the 1990 Metropolitan Opera (DG DVD), 4) the 2002 Stuttgart Staatsoper (TDK DVD), and 5) the 2004 Teatre del Liceu (Opus Arte DVD). Most of the versions have significant strong points. The 1985 Bayreuth has very good singing and acting in a satisfying modern production. For me, though, the sound and video quality have always been disappointing. The 1989 production has very good audio and video quality and a good, satisfying performance in a fairly interesting production. However, this Japanese set is extremely expensive and hard to buy. The 1990 Met performance is, amazingly, the only traditional staging available. It is definitely a very good performance, but I find the less traditional performances more stimulating. The audio and video quality are only good. The 2002 Stuttgart performance is well sung and the orchestra plays well. The sound is very good, video is OK. This version has been roundly criticized, but mostly for its stage design. It is pretty strange in parts (the Dragon in Siegfried, for example), but I enjoyed many parts of it. The 2004 Barcelona performance has been acclaimed by many reviewers, largely based on the stage design by Harry Kupfer. The singing and orchestral playing are OK, the conductor's tempo is generally slow. The sound recording is good, but the video (particularly for a brand new release) is quite disappointingly grainy to me.
Now we come to the 1993 Bayreuth/Barenboim production. Always important for Wagner, the orchestral playing is excellent, Barenboim's conducting is outstanding, and the recorded sound is excellent. The singing and acting are uniformly very good. The stage design, again by Harry Kupfer is modern (supposedly set in the 30's--Siegmund's costume is rather Indiana Jones-like). The deep Bayreuth stage is effectively used. Through all four operas I find the staging interesting and enjoyable to look at, not so spare as to be boring but not so dominant as to be awkward or overwhelming to the action. This performance has finally been released on DVD by Warner Classics in both the US and Europe in NTSC. I've learned from Warner that the original recording was in analog High Definition and their first step in preparing the curent DVD was to transfer the video recording to a digital 1080 line tape (so we can hope there will be an HD version later). There was also ambient sound recording in the original so the DTS soundtrack is real 5.1. The 16:9 anamorphic picture is a big improvement over the laser disc, much more detail; the sound is very good. An exciting reintroduction of a great performance. (The other 3 Ring operas will be released in the next 15 months, according to Warner.)
Rigoletto (2003)
Very successful updating of Rigoletto story (significant nudity) DVD is again available
Re-released in 2008, this film is available commercially on a PAL DVD from Amazon.fr and Amazon.co.uk.; an NTSC DVD of the original Dutch TV broadcast formerly was available from PremiereOpera.com in a homemade recording converted from PAL to NTSC; the color, the look of the production, and the sound are so important that I found the NTSC DVD markedly less enjoyable than the commercial PAL DVD.
To my taste, this is a very successful updating of Rigoletto into the present day (plot summary says 1960's, exemplified by the furnishings and clothing, but the casual cocaine use looks more present day to me). It is very carefully and vividly produced as a feature film by the Dutch company Opera Spanga. There are some flashes of humor in the film--most notably in the unexpected parody of Leo the Lion at the beginning of the film. There is a significant amount of frontal female and male nudity and simulated sex. I found these extremely effective because Rigoletto really is quite a rough story with a large sexual component.(I would say the story of the opera is actually about sex and sexual attraction.) The final act with the quartet and the killing of Gilda is riveting.
Verdi considered the Victor Hugo play on which Rigoletto was based to be "one of the greatest creations of the modern theater" (it was removed from the Paris stage after one performance in 1832 for political and moral reasons). Performance of the initial libretto was banned by the Venice police censors, citing the "disgusting immorality and obscene triviality" of the libretto. The first re-write was rejected by Verdi because it eliminated "everything that was original and powerful". The second re-write made the politically crucial change of setting and eliminated some of the more flagrantly libertine passages of the original. Other reviewers here have condemned the vulgarity and inappropriateness of this production. To me, this production seems much closer to what Verdi would have wanted if it had been possible at the time. For a laughably innocuous production see the 2001 Arena di Verona (TDK DVD). The 2000 Royal Opera production (Opus Arte DVD) would be an excellent choice for someone squeamish about so much sex on the screen (though there is still brief full frontal female and male nudity in the first act).
The production is the thing here, but the quality of the singing, the acting, the orchestral playing and the conducting are completely satisfactory and enjoyable. Dolby 5.1 audio and widescreen-only video quality are very high.