- Actors: Mireille Capelle, Graham Clark, John Hurst, Anatoli Kocherga, Juha Kotilainen
- Directors: Toni Bargalló
- Writers: Alexander Preis, Dmitri Shostakovich, Nikolai Leskov
- Format: Classical, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC, Import
- Language: Russian
- Subtitles: English
- Region: (US and Canada This DVD will probably NOT be viewable in other countries. Read more about DVD formats.)
- Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
- Number of discs: 1
- MPAA Rating:
- Studio: Capitol ( EMI )
- Release Date: Oct 26 2004
- Run Time: 187 minutes
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- ASIN: B0002TTTJW
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Most helpful customer reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
First class in all respects,
By
This review is from: Shostakovich;Dimitri Lady Macb (DVD)
Here's a great example of why I pay far more attention to Amazon's readers' reviews these days than those of the self-styled experts in the British music press.I've known, and loved, the Rostropovich recording of this work for years, but hesitated to buy this DVD after reading a dismissive review in the Gramophone. Then I read some favourable readers' reviews on the various Amazon websites and took the plunge. Musically and visually, this is a superb performance. Acting, singing, staging is all spot on. Christopher Ventris and Nadine Secunde in the leading roles look exactly right and are completely inside their roles, Secunde the neglected, frustrated and bored wife of a rich man, Ventris the incurable skirt-chaser. Anatoli Kotcherga is brilliant as the coarse, boorish father-in-law of Katerina, a tour-de-force of a performance. Amongst the lesser roles Graham Clark as the Shabby Peasant and Juha Kotilainen as the Chief of Police deserve special mention for both their singing and acting, and of course there's Yevgeny Nesterenko in the cameo part of the Old Convict, thunderous of voice if somewhat underpowered in the acting department. This ending, with Katerina staring into the auditorium stunned with misery, isn't quite what Shostakovich had in mind but it works beautifully and you're in no doubt as to what her next action will be as the curtain drops. Throughout the opera, Anissimov and the Orchestra of the Gran Teatre del Liceu play magnificently, giving us that authentic, spectral, Shostakovich sound, ably abetted by a strong chorus. Staging is representative rather than realistic, and very thought-provoking. I love what's been done with the interludes, on-stage mimes highlighting and commenting on the action. I have not seen the Jansons dvd, which also features Ventris in the role of Sergey, but I hear the choice between it and this one is a question of hair-splitting. Either way you should get to know this masterpiece of an opera.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.2 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews) 28 of 29 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thoroughly decadent production; thoroughly decadent opera,
By Richard - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Shostakovich;Dimitri Lady Macb (DVD)
Keep the children away; this is definitely R rated. I had heard but not seen Lady Macbeth before and was impressed. Here I am overwhelmed. My flesh crawled the last ten minutes and I finished beyond tears. This is definitely one of the five great 20th century operas. That Stalin scared Shostakovich out of opera over this counts as one of his crimes against humanity. This production takes a couple liberties with the original including the ending but makes its case powerfully. Nadine Secunde embodies Katerina in all her boredom, longing, oppression and finally despair. Her final frozen paralysis will linger with me a long time. Christopher Ventris resembles a svelt Alec Baldwin. He oozes sex. How often can you say that of a tenor? No wonder Katerina falls for him. And his betrayal of her is numbing. There is not a weak link in singing or acting throughout the huge cast. Anissimov conducts a slow performance in comparison with Rostropovich and Myung on CD (almost half an hour longer), but it does not seem slow. Indeed the production has an inevitable undertow toward disaster from the start. If you do not see this performance you are missing a milestone in 20th century opera. True there seems to be something fishy about the sound at times, as was the case in the company's Hamlet, but that is a minor irritation.
26 of 27 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Superlative,
By Archie - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Shostakovich;Dimitri Lady Macb (DVD)
I have long been a great fan of Petr Weigl, and gave his production of Lady MacBeth of Mtsensk 5 stars. At the time I thought that no live production could surpass it as a dramatic musical performance. I was wrong.I bought this production because I am also a fan of Nadine Secunde and would have been prepared to overlook a few weak performances just to see what she could do with this musically and dramatically demanding role. As it turned out, not only does she do a superlative job, but so does the rest of the cast and orchestra. Although the theatrical set could never be as good as that of the Weigl cinema production, the versatility of it and the lighting were more than appropriate and enhanced the drama. In addition, this production as all the bits that Weigl edited out. I found the sound and the vision of the DVD very good indeed. What with multiple camera angles and close-ups, sensitive editing has the ability to enhance the theatrical experience. This production certainly does that. I cannot recommend it highly enough. 22 of 24 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Check second opinion,
By Ben Lin "operaben" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Shostakovich;Dimitri Lady Macb (DVD)
Let me leave the performance of this live recording to a later time...I have to say that I totally DISAGREE with the previous reviewer in terms of the audio and video quality of this DVD release. On my system, the audio quality is absolutely 1st rate. No matter I used LPCM or dts5.1 for the reproduction. The sound stage and sound clarity is beautifully captured, with adequate dynamic, especially in the climax in ACT2. The video quality is first rate for today's DVD standard. (Of course, it can not compare with 1080i resultion of satellite broadcast). The lighting on stage is a matter of taste, but for most part, I think the major roles on stage are more than adequately spot-lighted. And just as a refernce data, the transport stream quatity on this DVD is close to the upper bound (mostly beyond 9 mb/s) |
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