Customer Reviews

Adams - Death of Klinghoffer / Randle, Sylvan, Howard, Maltman, Boutros, Melrose, Bickley, LSO

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I just finished watching Penny Woolcock's film of John Adams' "The Death of Klinghoffer" and am trying to find energy and calm while writing this and wiping away two hours of tears. The hype surrounding the film was not false, this is a piece which is nothing less than devastating. Although I'm somewhat familiar with the original recording of the opera, this is my first experience "seeing" it - understanding that this is different than any stage version could possibly be. It is indeed difficult to watch and I watched the majority of it through tears and shaking my head. The balancing is clear and it is not difficult to have genuine feelings of sadness for the plight of the Palestinians while at the same time recoiling in horror at the actions they choose.

Sanford Sylvan is staggeringly good, creating a character of likeable sensitivity, warmth and strength even an hour before he sings a note. And that smile Marilyn sings about really could light up a room. Sylvan's portrayal is so "there" he made me wish I'd known this man. An example of this occurs (while still silent) in the first moments of the hijacking, Leon cradles and tries to protect and comfort his wife but the tears in his eyes she cannot see give off a myriad of emotions - helpless impotence to control the situation, fear and what else I can only imagine. The scene of his brutal, incomprehensible murder is chilling more than words can describe. At least my words. His "floating" aria provides a calming effect that is at once eerily beautiful yet disturbing to watch. (Woolcott stated the underwater cameramen were amazed at Sylvan's remarkable breath control allowing him to stay underwater for minutes at a time, eyes wide open).

Yvonne Howard's Marilyn simply breaks the heart, her final aria nearly unbearable in its poignancy. I can't understand the criticisms levelled at the scene before her husband's death where she's prattling on about pain, and idle chatter. She doesn't believe her husband is in any grave danger and she's doing what many of we humans typically do . . . chatter about things not terribly important - anything to take our minds off the horror of the situation at hand. How does one not get that? Very high marks to Ms. Howard.

One of the passengers on board sums up the unbelievability of such situations "Horrible . . . horrible, to see one's fellow men become like beasts" In an all too human moment, one of her next lines expresses her embarrassment as she thinks "At least we're not Jews."

Like Mr. Sylvan, Christopher Maltman as the Captain exhibits a natural ease in front of the camera, even in his gut wrenching role worried about the fate of his passengers. Another extraordinary performance.

I know this opera continues to be controversial sparking harsh criticism and intolerance, which I find ironic since the heart of the work is about intolerance and the inhumanity we perpetuate upon one other as a result. I've discussed with many chosing to separate themselves from the terrorists but I cannot help but feel that even these most horrible of men are our brothers, we are from the same planet, the same family of man. We humans do terrible things to each other, even to those we purport to love, burying our heads in the sand does nothing to assist in helping resolve that which seems unresolvable. I know I sound hopelessly naive, but I've always had a faith that we won't blow ourselves up, despite what I see around us every day. Adam's opera and Woolcock's film is but a microcosm of that which is far greater than what we see and hear on screen.

Technically, the film is unique, the singers actually singing live on location not lipsynching. This gives a unique, credible quality to the film (and lets you stop worrying about synchronization for once in an opera film). The only non-live singing performance is that of Omar, sung by mezzo, Susan Bickley rather than using a countertenor. His great aria of longing to depart the earth still gives me chills.

This thing will stay with me for a while. I can't recommend highly enough viewing this unique, disturbingly powerful work. Many who have not experienced Klinghoffer, have complained about its being pro-Palestinian. This is something I never feel. The contempt I felt for these terrorists especially Rambo who was not the one to shoot Klinghoffer, is palpable from the way the characters are drawn. Others have stated the work is an insult to the Klinghoffer family - something I don't believe anyone who knows the work can state honestly painting, as it does a picture of a strong, deeply likeable man who's death is nothing less than an atrocity.

I can only agree with the critic at Jewish Film who with both eyes open wrote:

"... the creators were denounced as unabashedly pro-Palestinian for humanizing the terrorists. In actual fact, the libretto gives voice to heartbreaking sufferings by both Israelis and Palestinians. A decade later, in the wake of unrelenting Middle East conflict, many see the oepra's passionate exploration of terrorism from all viewpoints as more important than ever in stimulating dialogue about an intractable situation . . . no matter where you fall on the political spectrum, The Death of Klinghoffer will elicit heated discussion - - and quite possibly, tears."

I urge others to experience this overwhelming achievement for themselves. I can't see how this opera can fail to move anyone who watches this.

For my money, Adam's political balance in the opera is just right - as evidenced by the controversy and outrage on both sides represented.

The film opens with the two 'overtures' of equal length - the chorus of exiled Palestinians and the chorus of exiled Jews (sung perfectly by the LSO chorus). The former is accompanied by haunting footage of the Palestinians being driven from their homes in 1948 to make room for the incoming ex-European Jews. The latter plays over equally haunting holocaust footage. The stage is set, and numerous visual links are created between that introduction and later parts of the opera.

I thought Adams' harmonies were compelling and his music has a sense of direction and fragments of melody that belie the 'minimalist' tag he is often lumped with. Christopher Maltman is worthy of special note as a splendid baritone - I'm sure he makes a wonderful lieder singer.

This is cinematic opera - not an opera recording - and as such I think it works very well. I was left with no prejudice against either the Arabs or the Jews - more overwhelming sadness and frustration as it brings home something of the depths of the problem. Everyone has been hurt so badly, and the problems have been etched into history so profoundly, how can justice truly be served from here? Claims abound, but genuinely satisfactory solutions do not.

A sobering, prophetic film that takes on so many deeper layers of meaning in the light of September 11, 2001. According to the booklet, a performance of the choruses was scheduled in Boston in late 2001 and were cancelled because of sensitivities arising from 9/11. A real shame - perhaps there could scarcely have been a more appropriate reflection for us in the West at that time.

As a generous bonus, the DVD includes a 47 minute documentary on the making of this film. The film itself is 119 minutes long.

The Film is in 16:9 format; the documentary in 4:3. Soundtrack is in Stereo only for the documentary; alternatives of stereo and Dolby 5.1 surround for the film. There is a director's commentary available over the film, in stereo only.

Subtitles are in English; French; German; Italian and Spanish, the opera is sung in English. The documentary is in English and no subtitles are available for it.

A wonderfully moving and impartial (in spite of what some of the other reviewers have said!) human drama. The film shows how the sorrow of the Palestinians and Israelis flows from generation to generation and always results in personal tragedy. All of the terrorists and hostages are personalized and their fear is made real by superb acting and singing to wonderful music. The artificiality of much opera dissolves in the immediacy of the filming, and the result is very direct and moving.
Very valuable on this CD are the extras: a full rerun of the whole opera with the background comments of the director and lead singers, and a talk with the director and John Adams himself, commenting on this new art form. Superb performances by Maltman and Howard.

Penny Woolcock's edition of THE DEATH OF KLINGHOFFER trims away some of the contemplative music of John Adams. But you won't feel the loss. Her cuts, and her camerawork, sharpen the urgency of the story and drive it forward. Her selection of locations and her excellent direction of the actor-singers enfolded me in the drama and elucidated story-lines that I had not fully appreciated on listening to the box-set CD before. (The singing itself is very good indeed, as is the acting.) KLINGHOFFER now, seen through Woolcock's work, beautifully conveys the sorrow of hate -- and how seriously mistaken it is to say to oneself, as the passengers setting out on the Achille Lauro might have done if they gave a thought to the misery of the Middle East, "Nothing to do with me." This DVD makes the tragedy of despair, and of wrongdoing (passed along through generations) by Israelis / Jews and Palestinians against one another, somberly and beautifully clear.

Director Penny Woolcock deserves an immense amount of credit for providing a vibrant, emotionally expansive if not altogether dramatically effective 2003 screen translation of what was likely the last decade's most controversial opera. What began as an elaborate oratorio in 1991 was renowned composer John Adams' highly emotional "The Death of Klinghoffer", a controversial work with even greater political and emotional resonance post-9/11. The story concerns itself with the 1985 hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro by members of the Palestinian Liberation Front. It is related in a series of arias and recitatives by critical participants in the situation - the ship's captain and first officer; the four terrorists; and key passengers who were held captive over three days, in particular, the Klinghoffers who were celebrating their 36th wedding anniversary.

Adams' familiar post-minimalist music turns out to be surprisingly compatible with the true-life story, as the propulsive vocal parts blend well with Alice Goodman's politically charged libretto. Sung off-screen to vivid montages, the beautiful choruses provide effective bridges and a broader context to the immediate drama of the opera, an aspect that was likely left quite abstract when sung onstage. The other powerful dimension Woolcock brings to this adaptation is the use of real locations and archived footage to make relevant the opera's overall abstraction to the viewer. This is a brave move since the political situation suddenly becomes actualized with the film. As it turns out, it is a dramatically smart move given that Woolcock has a strong cinematic sense of the story, for instance, she apparently cut twenty minutes of the music to make the story flow better, repositions powerful solo arias to enhance the characters' interactions, and adds often traumatizing historical footage and faux-news reports to give the story even greater realism. Solely from that standpoint, this may be the best screen adaptation of a major opera I have ever seen.

The biggest challenge of this production, however, is Goodman's libretto, which seems intent on supporting both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For instance, the opera takes the bold step of putting Israelis and Nazis on the same plain by comparing images of a post-Holocaust concentration camp with those of a mass grave from the 1982 slaughter at the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps. In making such an exerted effort to share the motivation of the terrorists as well as the suffering of the crew and passengers, the drama becomes somewhat diluted by the multiple perspectives. By contrast, look at Paul Greengrass' recent "United 93" for a successful example of shifting varying viewpoints without losing the overall dramatic momentum. Some contend that the opera takes discernible political sides, though I think it's a mistake to brand the work as purely pro-Palestinian since the Klinghoffers are portrayed sympathetically if rather one-dimensionally as people caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. In particular, the execution of husband Leon, paralyzed from a stroke and wheelchair-bound, is shown shockingly as the act of a thug more than that of a political terrorist.

Fortunately, Woolcock has recruited world-class singers who are able to tone down their singing for the cameras. The standouts are baritone Christopher Maltman as the conflicted captain; fellow baritone Leigh Melrose, who makes the macho posturing of the aptly named terrorist, "Rambo", feel palpable; and in the film's only comic moment, soprano Kirsten Blasé, who makes her cowering showgirl a convincing media whore. Surprisingly, the Klinghoffers are not given arias to sing until near the end, but mezzo-soprano Yvonne Howard is dynamic as Marilyn especially as she confronts the captain. Baritone Sanford Sylvan, a familiar Adams regular who played Chou En-Lai in "Nixon in China", has one powerful aria sung as a voiceover to an extended, haunting image of his dead body sinking deeper into the ocean. In another interesting voiceover done to accommodate the original opera's doubling of roles, a non-singing actor, Emil Marwa, plays the most vulnerable terrorist, Omar, while mezzo Susan Bickley sings his inner thoughts. The 2003 DVD has a surprising number of extras for an opera production, including a commentary track from Woolcock and various cast members. The best extra is an interesting making-of documentary, "Filming `The Death of Klinghoffer'", which includes tandem interviews with Adams and Woolcock and goes into the major aspects of putting the challenging production together.

This is a riveting production that almost redefines how one can view opera. With the visual boundries between
film, TV and stage blurred (or melded together) the viewer/listener feels an immediate relevance to an event that is within recent history and very much pertinent to world affairs today. Yet, it is still opera. The production is finely performed and convincingly acted with a touch of realism that is unsettling. The only flaw, if there is one, occurs in the sound mix between action and score. Sometimes Adams' music and the fine performers are under balanced. However, this too seems to be part of the plan where the listener feels like a particpant. It's all wonderfully discomforting.

This show has run into plenty of trouble over the years just for the subject matter. It tells the story of a truly horrific event when human beings were no longer human beings but heartless monsters acting out of rage, hatred, and everything evil in our world today. The story is highly disturbing and yet this is an opera? Adams is often criticized as a cold minimalist, but what the opera shows is that unlike Philip Glass or Steve Reich, Adams can use music as expressively as any high romantic composer. His sense for "the moment" is so mature that once you start watching this, you really can not stop.

And for Al, or anyone else who feels the need to use amazon.com as a pulpit for their political rhetoric: Grow up.

Just this once, I'd like to avoid controversy, eschew politics, pose as a cultural tourist from another galaxy -- or from any other century than the Terrible 20th, the century I would least have chosen for the bulk of my lifetime if I'd had any options -- and evaluate this "performance" on strictly technical grounds. You'll find plenty of fierce partisanship in other reviews, by people with greater moral certainty than I can claim, and you will NOT be able to watch/hear this DVD without "taking sides" ... or possibly taking both sides, or neither. [If you don't remember the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro in 1985, you'd be smart to run a search and get the basic historical event established in your mind. It would be absurd to pretend that this opera/film is not a political statement.]

For starters, this is NOT a film of John Adams's opera "The Death of Klinghoffer." It's a film grafted on the music of that opera -- a "trope" in musicological terms -- that doesn't attempt to replicate the whole opera as it was staged in Brussels and San Francisco in 1991. I was present for the SF performances. This isn't the same work, though much of the music is revisited. What film director Penny Woodcock has created, in some sort of collaboration with John Adams, is effectively a new genre, an operatic film rather than a filmed opera. It's worth seeing/hearing on that basis alone, as a bold experiment, even if the results distress or disappoint you.

The film is a collage of dramatized violence, actual newsreel footage, and out-of-sequence scenes of happenings during and after the hijacking of the cruise ship. The principal characters - the Captain, First Officer Giordano Bruno, Marilyn Klinghoffer, Leon Klinghoffer himself, and each of the four Palestinian hijackers -- sing their thoughts as arias, as if on stage, while much of the contextual footage is "underscored" by choral and orchestral music. The music is very good -- let's be clear about that -- in the unique eclectic modernist/minimalist idiom in which John Adams composes. But the opera upstages itself on film just as it did on stage in its premiere performances. I don't think John Adams expected or intended otherwise. The performers in this film achieve what might seem impossible, that is, being plausible both as singers and as movie actors. They exude a kind of earnest dignity in both tasks that elevates and universalizes the emotional drama. I totally disagree with reviewers who have said that this event, the hijacking and the murder, are beyond the scope of opera; I'd argue that only Opera -- the synthesis of music and theater -- has the power to render the impact of such an event.

That was my thought at the performances in San Francisco, that the goal of this opera was a transcendence of mere Art, mere hoity-toity extravagant entertainment, seeking instead a kind of public catharsis through music, theater, and dance comparable to the cathartic impact of Greek tragedy on the citizens of ancient Athens. And I thought composer Adams and librettist Alice Goodman had come astonishingly close, not yet perfect, in need of editing and focusing, but close to the sort of opera that would mean something more to its audience than a balmy evening's diversion. I foresaw revisions, further rehearsals, additions and cuts before the scheduled performances in Los Angeles....

As it happened, the LA performances were cancelled because of controversy, specifically because the hijackers were depicted with human sympathy, and there has never yet been another staging of the work in the USA. John Adams's other major operas -- the earlier "Nixon in China" and the recent "Doctor Atomic" -- have also generated political controversy and outrage. Relevance? I like that in an opera.

First of all, I do love this opera for all sorts of reasons, most of them musical.

Second, I've seen two stagings of this opera, as well as this film, and I can tell you they were all pretty terrible. The original Peter Sellars-directed staging is nearly unwatchable, and as bad as this film, but in very different ways. I'm convinced that this piece is totally unstageable and unfilmable, and should be presented as an oratorio, letting the music and (often very difficult to hear and/or comprehend) text do the work.

Third, Penny Woolcock means well, but she's an artistic moron. Her "realistic," location-specific setting of the action and music is a bold idea, but this was not the opera to do it with. There's a reason the original production (as bad as it was) avoided sailor uniforms, hawaiian-shirted tourists, and dancing girls decked out in feathers and sequins--it makes the whole thing ridiculous. Just because it's based on recent historical events, and some of the libretto is direct quotes, doesn't mean it's a naturalistic opera! It's musically about as far from literalism as it could get.

There's hardly any "dramatic action" at all--the stage directions in the libretto are along the lines of "The passengers are transferred to the cafeteria." Unlike "Nixon In China," Adams seems to have deliberately set the words in such a way as to make them very difficult to discern. Apparently, the working relationship with Alice Goodman did not go well. The choruses, of which there are many (with titles like "Ocean Chorus"), are totally incomprehensible, and function as musical statements more than anything else.

Fourth, don't pay any attention to the political venom surrounding this opera. I defy anyone to clearly state what its politics really are. It goes out of its way to give voice to "both sides," whatever that means. Some say making art out of terrorism is inherently immoral; I would direct those people to educate themselves on the history of opera (or theater, or music, or painting, or literature, or film) to find endless examples of reprehensible actions and their perpetrators, both historical and fictional, presented and examined without condemnation.

These reactions are all bogus anyway and have nothing to do with the opera itself, because anyone who really listens to the whole thing (without watching this execrable film, and without following along with the often-incomprehensible libretto) will have a hard time discerning what the hell is supposed to be going on, or what "point" is being made. Which is, I think, deliberate--like it or not.

Short version: get the CDs/mp3s, listen to the whole thing in one sitting without watching or reading anything, and see what you get from it. At the very least, the music is dense, intense and gorgeous.

The review by G. P. Padillo says all that I might have, and probably better.

Doubtless due to "political" pressure, this wonderful production has been withdrawn from the United States. That is a great pity, but shows the power of pressure groups. I have been told that the US distributor will not carry it. But that leaves the question of why Amazon.com cannot order it directly from Decca in other countries.

It is available in Europe in International format. I have just descovered that it is available at amazon.ca.

This is a must see.