16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Ms. Midler's Best Performance, June 7, 2006
July 2010 UPDATE: AS STATED BY OTHERS, THIS DVD WAS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH REGULAR PLAYERS USED TO BE SOLD IN THE STATES BUT READ NOTE AT THE END; THINGS HAVE CHANGED...
Diva Las Vegas was produced in Germany (under PAL Format). DIVA was filmed during Bette's last two shows of her Vegas MGM Grand performance from 1995-1996. It is a MUST HAVE for all Ms. Midler's fans. A DVD was not produced or sold in the US because of her contract with Disney during those years.
Bette starts her show with a unique & typical of her entrance; coming down from the sky in a cloud. She then proceeds with the usual welcome and sings the expected oldies including the First Wife's Club, Bed of Roses, and other great classics followed by the regular Sophie Tucker jokes with more spice than usual (remember, it's Vegas). Next, an exquisite section on Burlesque; four terrific girls and only three costumes; yeap, someone's showing more than what expected. Vegas allowed it...
The second act starts with DeLores De-Lago; the wheel chaired mermaid who then decides to become a Home Shopping TV sales-woman [competing with Joan Rivers] and promoting her "Balls" to improve physical condition. You will be surprised on how Bette masters said balls. The section concludes with eight wheel chaired mermaids performing on stage at one time, singing New York-New York.
The show continues with a love song from her native Islands; Hawaii which prepares us for the grand finale singing the famous themes & love songs from Beaches, The Rose and the rest of her classic repertoire. It ends with the introduction of the orchestra, the back-up singers, the Harlettes and the great Bobby Lyle plus an unexpected and truly emotional "encore" of three songs.
Overall, the Divine Ms. M offers in Diva Las Vegas a much more sophisticated performance than on Divine Madness and a better production than Kiss my Brass (the 2005-2006 tour). The DVD sound is excellent and the picture surprisingly great for a PAL format. Diva compiles more than two hours of continued energy from the Divine Ms. M. This is a DVD that you will watch many times and will be proud it to show your friends, relatives & neighbors.
NOTE: If you do decide on getting this very expensive Germany produced DVD, buy an affordable programmable DVD player with Multi Region capability (for $30.00 TO $70.00 or so). You might have to change the region code from 1 (USA) to 2 [Europe] or to 0 [no region] following the instructions found on the Internet. Once accomplished, the device will play DVDs from all over the world including those from Japan, Spain, Great Britain and the US. Otherwise, burn the DVD into your computer HDD and watch the VOB version over & over. BTW, many current types of software allow you to burn VOBs into Disks. You can figure out the rest...
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Divine Diva, April 17, 2007
Folks - Save yourself some money and go straight to the Amazon UK website. With the exchange rate and shipping, it's a heck of a lot cheaper than what the used vendors are selling it for. FYI - you need a multi region DVD player for this one.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Divine Ms M Live, January 5, 2006
I have the VHS edition of this show and it is very good although a little tamer than some of her other live recordings. The "1" rating below is deceptive (especially since it is written in French). Their problem was the DVD wasn't compatible with their region, nothing to do with the actual content.
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