27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Highlights Disk, August 6, 2002
This review is from: Massenet - Werther (DVD)
The singing of the two principles (especially Fassbaender) is good and the film looks pretty. But the director compresses the performance to feature film length by deleting every scene that does not involve the two principal singers. This is not a performance of "Werther"; it is a disk of highlights.
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23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The film puts you in the period-appropriate mood, February 17, 2000
This review is from: Massenet - Werther (DVD)
People who have issues with opera-films, where a film is superimposed on a recording will find them here (from lip-synching to the issue of "realism"). I feel this film does justice to this work. The film can only improve so much on the opera itself, and it's no news that "French opera had a bad century". There is little action in this opera, the heroes are trapped in a passive existence. It's mainly about a mood, and as such it is boring to watch on stage. The film brings out the melancholic-yearning-pining-wasting-away-with-grief state of mind of its protagonists. The outdoor shots in Prague are very beautiful and help to whisk the viewer away to a different era, very slow in pace and full of pathos. Dvorsky's and Fassbaender's French diction is good. Dvorsky has the perfect voice for the role. He puts to shame all post-war rivals in his big act III aria, and stacks up nicely even with Gigli. His top is free, the voice is full bodied and projects the drama; he maintains a sensual quality worthy of Di Stefano. I never noticed how beautiful Fassbaender's mezzo is; she sings very intelligently, giving a character to what is a rather limited role. There isn't a weak link in the Czech cast, and the conductor Libor Pesek paces the work with the right balance between the lyric and the dramatic. Audio quality is excellent, the video quality is better than VHS but isn't the best (it's not as good as the Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk film, that was shot 7 years later). Overall, this is a good way to access this opera, which otherwise could have been delegated to the status of a dead relic of a genre that went permanently out of fashion as soon as Puccini's sun rose.
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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not Quite Massenet's "Werther", September 30, 2005
This review is from: Massenet - Werther (DVD)
The singers are splendid and the chosen settings are fine, but at least one-sixth of the opera is missing. The focus on the lovers is understandable in giving viewers the most memorable musical moments in the opera, but it violates the dramatic balance of the original opera. The love of Charlotte and Werher needs to be seen in the context of a small-city milieu (Wetzlar, Germany) where people drink, play cards, and celebrate 50th wedding anniversaries. We are shown the church and the townsfolk going and coming from the service, but we don't see the old pastor and wife who are being feted for their years of marriage. That's an important foil to the disfunctional marriage of Charlotte and Albert and to the cause of that marriage: Charlotte's promise to her dying mother to marry Albert. It's also a foil to the foolish passion of Werther and the trouble that he causes for Charlotte and Albert. In addition, the balance of the Christmas carol near the beginning of Act I (a rehearsal in June) with the performance a year and a half later when Werther lies dying of a bullet in his gut is lost because the children don't have their June rehearsal. No wonder that some of these reviewers think the opera slow-moving. Paradoxically, the opera would seem more lively if more lively scenes were included, even if the opera ran its full length.
It must also be said that, contrary to the unhistoric view of one reviewer, Massenet's opera was not a last gasp of romantic opera before Puccini, but a forward step away from the traditional 5-act French opera with its "de rigeur" ballet and 3-4 hour length. Massenet is looking forward to "Boheme" and "Butterfly," not back to "Faust" and "Le Prophete," for example. Nonetheless, I love what is here in the Weigl film and see it in light of my knowledge of the rest of the opera.
(Secondary complaints: (1) The costumes are 19th century, but the action is 18th century. (2) Werther fails to wear the costume specified by Goethe: blue jacket and yellow-buff trousers. That costume became favored by young would-be Werthers after the 1774 publication of the novel.)
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