Search - Giuseppe Verdi - Macbeth / Nucci, Verrett, Riccardo Chailly, Teatro Comunale di Bologna (1987 film) on DVD

Great recording, poorly filmed

Maurice D'Archonnoir | Istanbul | 04/05/2008

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Excellent casting, beautiful recording, very nicely chosen environments, and being a great admirer of madame verrett, this film version of my favorite verdi opera with her performance as lady macbeth seemed at first destined to be a great production. But the visual direction is terribly detached from the music. not even a trace of musical inspiration can be found in it. For instance, during lady macbeth's whole grand aria in the first act, Madame Verrett comes up and down pointlessly from some dark stairs in the castle. That incoherence destroys the whole atmosphere on this production where it's impossible to find a glimpse of creativity during the whole film. The witches are so silly looking that I am grateful that the ballet is not included. A great exemplar on how to waste some marvellous audio-visual material.
And even if it's a very decent audio rendition of this masterpiece, there is the abbado or leinsdorf recordings which easily outshines this recording as listening experience.
The only visual advantage is to be able to witness the strong acting performances of Madame Verrett and Monsieur Nucci who are trying to survive the debile production.
Good dts sound quality, available subtitles in french, english, original italian, german, includes also a "making of" documentary."

Could have been a lot better.........

Operafilly | Fallbrook, Ca United States | 08/03/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I much prefer the video of the stage production with Verrett and Capucilli. The movie really drags and odd creatures are quite ridiculous and distracting. This is a very dark opera, but the director made it absolutely murky. More care given to the background that the characters.

I adore Verrett so I stuck it our. But she's not nearly as compelling as in the live production. Sometimes movies of operas work very well.......but not so much here. I gave 4 stars just for the singing. I won't revisit this one."

Macbeth a la Conan the Barbarian

P. Sutherland | Berea, Ohio, USA | 04/02/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you like barbarian type movies (I've never been able to sit through one), I think you will love this opera set in the gloomy underbelly of a 10th Century Belgian castle. Apparently, also set in the days before the invention of personal hygiene, most of the villagers and castle personnel are streaked with grime and appear unkept and squalid. The many soldiers are concealed beneath medieval armor.

The worst (or best) of all this creepiness are the black-haired, blue-skinned witches who appear as some combination of zombies, she-wolves and monkeys, and who travel on all fours constantly exposing their prominent, lean gluteals, covered only in primitive g-strings. They are bare breasted, naturally, and have zombie-like faces. Let me just call them "monkey witches". They first appear on a deserted battlefield littered with decaying corpses.

Adding to all this gloom, the color range of this film is primarily gray-blue to black, except for the mouths of the monkey witches, which are bright red. There seems to be a lot of creepiness for creepiness' sake, too. For example, the monkey witches climb on to the bars between the castle and the pit they are occupying and just hang there during one of their choruses. You see them eating like wolves (no hands) the leftovers from the banquet tables complete with rats that do not run away. All this said, the witches sing like a troupe of angels.

And the principal characters, Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Banquo and Macduff are tidy and good looking. The voices of Samuel Ramey and Veriano Luchetti, (who wisely refused to participate?) are lip-synched by Banquo (Johan Leysen) and Macduff (Philippe Volter). Luchetti's tenor is gorgeous and rates five stars. Shirley Verrett is convincing as Lady Macbeth. Leo Nucci is competent as Macbeth.

If you like Macbeth, of course, you will want to see this one, too. I prefer my operas and witches a little more updated and stylized, e.g., the Hampson Macbeth. But I enjoyed this one. It was my first barbarian movie!"

Pretty good

K. Kehler | B.C., Canada | 03/11/2008

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This is a pretty good version of Verdi's Macbeth. I tend to favour movie versions -- perhaps because the vast majority of operas on DVD are filmed performances in opera houses, and I just like to see something different. This 1987 version (only now released on DVD) has many of the qualities one looks for in a good film version of an opera: it is superbly filmed and the setting is ideal(the indoor scenes are filmed in an ancient Belgian crusader's castle, including some great shots in the catacombs). It is also quite well cast, although it's a bit unusual to hear Sam Ramey sing Banquo's role but see Johan Leysen (who I don't know) act the part. As for the central figures, Lady Macbeth and Macbeth himself, Shirley Verrett and Leo Nucci, respectively, do a credible job. Both have good voices, and Verrett outdoes herself here in terms of singing. But I find her lacking passion, perhaps only slightly but that's enough. As for Nucci, he's hardworking but I find he gives us a slightly too cerebral Macbeth. Perhaps some of this reaction of mine is due to his somewhat un-warrior-like appearance. Macbeth must be a warrior who is driven to ponder the world, and his fate, but he mustn't be a thinker who takes up the sword ... and then reverts to being a thinker. Not at all. As for the rest, the music is excellent, definitely one of the strengths of this version, and the weird sisters are excellent (much better than the 1950s bag ladies as in this winter's Met production): very compelling and frightening/eye-catching. The whole thing is generally very impressive, bar the things I have mentioned."