Puccini - Madama Butterfly
by Jean-Pierre Ponnelle
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Actor: Christa Ludwig, Michel Sénéchal, Mirella Freni, Plácido Domingo, Robert KernsDirector: Jean-Pierre Ponnelle
Brand: Universal Studios
Cinematographer: Ernst Wild
Cinematographer: Wolfgang Treu
Writer: Jean-Pierre Ponnelle
Producer: Fritz Buttenstedt
Writer: David Belasco
Writer: Giuseppe Giacosa
Writer: Jean-Louis Martinoty
Writer: Luigi Illica
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); German (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Italian (Subtitled); Italian (Original Language), DTS 5.0; English (Original Language); German (Original Language); French (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language); Mandarin Chinese (Original Language)
Format: Classical, Color, DTS Surround Sound, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 146 minutes
Published: 2011-05-05
DVD Release Date: 2005-06-14
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Deutsche Grammophon
DVD Reviews of Puccini - Madama Butterfly
DVD Review: Come on, people...it isn't that bad
Summary: 4 Stars
I can't understand all this carping about how rotten Jean-Pierre Ponnelle's film is. Okay, this isn't Orson Welles. The film is certainly flawed, with a few cheesy moments, most of which have been mentioned in other reviews(the opening, with Domingo in a T-shirt comically running through a paper wall, the bizarre dream sequence, Goro as a bucktoothed stereotype). These flaws are what prevent me from giving the film a five star rating. But there are also some very beautiful moments, and besides, from an aural standpoint, you aren't going to find a better performance of Madama Butterfly ANYWHERE. Get a grip, folks. To hear Freni and Domingo at their prime singing what is arguably Puccini's greatest score(it is certainly his most beautiful) conducted by Herbert von Karajan, and for under twenty dollars, I would be willing to put up with the singers running around in clown makeup for two-and-a-half hours. The music making on this disc is simply too good not to be recommended just because the filmmaker's ambitions occasionally tax his reach.
For me, a good opera film captures the mood of the music. Butterfly is probably Puccini's most atmospheric, lush, and dreamy score(although La Fanciulla del West is stiff competition), and Ponnelle's film is appropriately dreamlike. Let's use the marvelous love duet that ends the first act as an example. For me, this duet, along with Liu's death scene from Turandot, represents Puccini at the very height of his musical-dramatic brilliance. The music is rapturous and erotic, delaying the crescendo until the moment becomes almost unbearable. Ponnelle paints this music in dreamlike images of ever-increasing passion. Granted, this film was made in 1974, so some of the more trippy moments might seem a little dated, but if you take that into account, the moment is beautifully filmed, haunting and evocative, just like the score. The image perfectly matches the music...isn't that what opera on film is all about? If this were the only example of this perfect union of sound and vision, then I would be less enthusiastic about the film as a whole, but throughout most of Madama Butterfly, Ponnelle manages that lush, languorous tide of images that matches Puccini's flowing music.
Regarding the sound portion, as I said before, you won't hear Butterfly performed better, that is a guarantee. Mirella Freni IS Cio-Cio-San, the innocence, the passion, the self-delusion, the heartbreak. Oh, and she sings the role to perfection, capturing the character's timidity and strength. Butterfly's entrance is probably my favorite musical entrance in all opera, and hearing Freni's singing, quiet at first and from a distance, gradually building as she and her bridal party make their arrival, is a breathtaking moment, outclassing any staged production I have ever seen. A very young Placido Domingo is in prime voice, and is ideally cast as the rake B.F. Pinkerton, initially cavalier to the point of being cruel, later violently regretful(too little, too late). He does look somewhat risible running in slow motion with his arms flailing about in his handlebar mustache, but overall he is a fine romantic lead. Robert Kerns has a strong and compassionate baritone voice, which matches his character's best qualities, the voice of reason, Pinkerton's disregarded conscience. Having Christa Ludwig in the role of Suzuki might be considered luxury casting, since her character is less prominent, but she makes the most of her time onstage as the matronly confidante to Butterfly, she is definitely at her prime vocally at this point in her career. Von Karajan's conducting is also in its prime, not as slow as it sometimes is, or else I didn't notice it because the slowness matches the languid tempo of much of the music. The sound quality is clear and full-bodied enough that hardly any of the notes are obscured.
Forget the negative reviews. If you love Butterfly, give this a chance. There are flaws, but considering the strengths of the performances and of much of the film, those flaws are easily overlooked.
Description of Puccini - Madama Butterfly
PUCCINI:MADAMA BUTTERFLY - DVD MovieOf all Puccini's major operas, the intimate tragedy of Madama Butterfly is least in need of elaborate staging and might therefore benefit most from the close scrutiny of film. The story is domestic, the setting Spartan, the incidental characters kept to a minimum. This 1974 version, however, demonstrates that Butterfly still needs a healthy injection of proscenium arch melodrama. Director Jean-Pierre Ponelle's production strives for realism but remains unfortunately studio-bound, having neither the benefit of location filming nor the heightened reality of an opera stage. The exterior is a perpetually fog-shrouded heath of indeterminate locale; the interior is cramped and unadorned. The setting is just too prosaic to contain the epic emotions of grand opera.
Thankfully, the cast is a superb one, headed by Plácido Domingo's rakish Pinkerton and Mirella Freni's rubicund Butterfly. Their singing is incomparable, as is Herbert von Karajan's musical direction of the Vienna Philharmonic. The singers mime to prerecorded music, which is occasionally disconcerting since when film demands close-ups, opera provides broad gestures. Musically, this Butterfly is impeccable. Visually it adds nothing that could not be seen to better effect in a stage version. --Mark Walker
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