Product Details

• Actors: Sergei Berezhnoi, Irina Kolpakova, Gennady Selyutsky, Kirov Ballet
• Format: Classical, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: All Regions
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Video Artists Int'l
• DVD Release Date: December 25, 2007
• Run Time: 131 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000YRY7WQ
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #203,948 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful masterpiece, April 7, 2008

By 

E. Willinger (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Glazunov: Raymonda [DVD Video] (DVD)

I must disagree with the previous review(er). While the Kirov production is visually rather dowdy and the DVD quality is often dull, the performance is hauntingly beautiful. Nobody dances like Irina Kolpakova any more and that's a shame. Her style is not dated but timeless - you can't find a purer example of true ballerina technique and manner. The whole company animates the formal mime and choreography with conviction. Anyone who is serious about ballet should see this.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Grainy but Great, April 2, 2010

By 

Satish Kamath (India) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Glazunov: Raymonda [DVD Video] (DVD)

Believe me, one of the clearest parts of this DVD is the cover (sic!). Even so, it is a class above the Bessmertnova version. I am not going to compare the technique of the two, or for that matter that of Plisetskaya. Each can stand on a podium specially built for them.
I again appeal to the powers that be, to take some time off and re-master this version into something clearer. If someone could do it for a film on Bolshoi Ballet of 1960s recording,I am sure this one would be worth it.

I think this ballet is popular with only a select set of Balletomanes. That may be because, it is not performed too often outside Russia (correct me if I am wrong).The storyline/techniques/execution/choreography are all one hell of a cliché. Most people who frequent the ballet have a surfeit of this kind of an execution with the goody goody princes and heroines and villains and fairies and dream sequences that there is nothing really new visually or otherwise if one goes by the Tchaikovsky trilogy and similar types of ballet formats.
Another reason is that Glazunov as a composer is yet to achieve the greatness in the ears of the music loving public that he deserves. Glazunov is no second-rate Tchaikovsky. In fact, the depth and coherence in his music according to me (brickbats welcome), go one step beyond Tchaikovsky and his other senior contemporaries. Glazunov's music demands time to be invested, but once that has been done, his music is pure treasure to say the least. I have been familiar with the ballet music of Glazunov long before I could get to see Raymonda on the screen. Incidentally, I wonder when someone is going to bring out a version of his Scenes from a Ballet Op.52, that was danced very regularly by Diaghilev's company. (I would suggest that the reader of this download that bit of music from somewhere and listen to it)
I think this ballet even in this grainy version would become far more enjoyable if people were to get to know the music of Glazunov a bit better, preferably before buying this DVD. It is far dreamier a piece than one would expect even from Glazunov.
I also know that there now exist other clearer productions of this ballet that are available. I am yet to see any of them, but all the same, I feel that this would be a great item in any ballet lover's library, thanks to say the least to Kolpakova.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A common man'spoint of view., November 17, 2009

By 

Richard Rawls "Richard Ardle Rawls" (Dublin Ga USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Glazunov: Raymonda [DVD Video] (DVD)

I had viewed Raymonda several times w/o becoming enamored by it like I was with Coppelia and Firebird for instance. However, when I learned that it was one of Maya Plisetskaya's favorite ballets,.....Maya Plisetskaya - Diva of Dance.....and heard her hum one of her favorite tunes from it, I became more interested and started paying better attention.

Raymonda, it turns out is full of beautiful melodies, but again, you have to pay attention. I wish I had a copy with Maya Plisetskaya, but wishing doesn't get the
shortsighted hierarchy at the Bolshoi to scrounge up a forgotten film or tape and release it to the public, does it? So, we will have to be satisfied with what IS available. To be honest, what we have in this case isn't all that bad. Irina Kolpakova in fact, is a very beautiful Raymonda. Her dancing may not be quite as dynamic as Plisetskaya's, but she is very close. By the way, Plisetskaya mentions Kolpakova affectionately in her autobiography, "I, Maya Plisetskaya", a very good read. Get it. Read it....I, Maya Plisetskaya.... Learn how the "polidioticrats" in the Soviet Union treated one of the greatest Prima Ballerina Assolutas who ever lived.

Ramonda's main shortcoming as a ballet is it's libretto, not a very compelling story line, but then, lots of ballets are weak in that department. Look at Don Quixote, for instance, yet DQ is a fabulous ballet because it is so much fun. Abderakhman, the Saracen prince, brings some very good dancing troupes to the stage to try to impress Raymonda, but he is successful only in entertaining US because Raymonda is not the least bit impressed. So he resorts to force, but the hero Jean De Brienne arrives just in time to save Ramonda from having to convert to Islam. Everyone, except Abderakhman and his entourage, live happily ever after. But, Raymonda may not have been very happy about bouncing off ole Jean De Brienne's hip as he carries her off to their honeymoon. Hey, it's a good ballet because of the DANCING...Richard.