Walter Felsenstein's staging of Jacques Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann at the Komische Opera Berlin.
Stella / Olympia / Antonia / Giulietta
Andreas / Cochenille / Franz / Pitichinaccio
Frank Drebin is persuaded out of retirement to go undercover in a state prison. There he has to find out what top terrorist, Rocco, has planned for when he escapes. Adding to his problems, Frank's wife, Jane, is desperate for a baby.
In 1988, young sisters Katie and Kristi befriend an invisible entity who resides in their home.
Shrek, Fiona, and Donkey set off to Far, Far Away to meet Fiona's mother and father, the Queen and King. But not everyone is happily ever after. Shrek and the King find it difficult to get along, and there's tension in the marriage. The Fairy Godmother discovers that Fiona has married Shrek instead of her son Prince Charming and plots to destroy their marriage.
Mecha Mutt, a revolutionary remote-controlled lunar rover resembling a large canine, goes rogue at Houston's Annual Science Expo. Scooby-Doo! Mecha Mutt Menace is the fourth in a series of direct-to-video short films.
The gang flies off to Africa for a video animal safari titled 'So Goodi!,' only to learn that - zoinks! - the creatures are actually shape-shifting jungle demons! In Homeward Hound, a "fiercely fanged" cat creature petrifies the competing pooches at a dog show, including the visiting Scooby-Doo! Finally, a giant Wakumi bird is stealing sculptures that are scheduled to be housed in a museum in New Mexico, Old Monster. There's never a dull moment when Scooby-Doo enters the scene!
A young boy learns that he has extraordinary powers and is not of this earth. As a young man, he journeys to discover where he came from and what he was sent here to do. But the hero in him must emerge if he is to save the world from annihilation and become the symbol of hope for all mankind.
Renowned oceanographer Steve Zissou has sworn vengeance upon the rare shark that devoured a member of his crew. In addition to his regular team, he is joined on his boat by Ned, a man who believes Zissou to be his father, and Jane, a journalist pregnant by a married man. They travel the sea, all too often running into pirates and, perhaps more traumatically, various figures from Zissou's past, including his estranged wife, Eleanor.
A retired San Francisco detective suffering from acrophobia investigates the strange activities of an old friend's wife, all the while becoming dangerously obsessed with her.
Aurora, a finicky woman, is in search of true love while her daughter faces marital issues. Together, they help each other deal with problems and find reasons to live a joyful life.
Not many people know that every house is secretly inhabited by little monsters! These furry creatures take care of a family’s house but cannot be seen. Finnick is a little monster, who doesn’t seem to care about his responsibility of making a home out of the house. But everything changes after a new family comes to his house. When Finn meets 13-year-old Christine, inexplicable events begin to happen in the city and life will never be the same again!
In the not-too-distant future, the aging gene has been switched off. To avoid overpopulation, time has become the currency and the way people pay for luxuries and necessities. The rich can live forever, while the rest struggle to negotiate for their immortality. A poor young man who suddenly comes into a fortune of time finds himself on the run from a corrupt police force known as the "time keepers".
An arrogant, high-powered attorney takes on the case of a poor altar boy found running away from the scene of the grisly murder of the bishop who has taken him in. The case gets a lot more complex when the accused reveals that there may or may not have been a third person in the room.
WrestleMania XXIV was the twenty-fourth annual WrestleMania PPV. The event took place on March 30, 2008, at the Citrus Bowl in Orlando. The first main event was a Singles match from the SmackDown brand that featured The Undertaker challenging World Heavyweight Champion Edge for the title. The second was a Triple Threat match from the Raw brand, in which WWE Champion Randy Orton defended against challengers Triple H and John Cena. The third was a singles match featuring ECW Champion Chavo Guerrero defending against Kane. Other matches include a No DQ match with Floyd Mayweather Jr. fighting The Big Show, a Money in the Bank ladder match with Carlito, Shelton Benjamin, MVP, CM Punk, Mr. Kennedy, Jericho, and John Morrison, and a retirement match between Shawn Michaels & Ric Flair.
Throughout his life Edward Bloom has always been a man of big appetites, enormous passions and tall tales. In his later years, he remains a huge mystery to his son, William. Now, to get to know the real man, Will begins piecing together a true picture of his father from flashbacks of his amazing adventures.
WrestleMania XXV was the twenty-fifth annual WrestleMania PPV. It was presented by the National Guard and took place on April 5, 2009 at Reliant Stadium in Houston, Texas. The first main event was a singles match for the WWE Championship that featured the champion, Triple H, defending against Randy Orton. The second was a Triple Threat match for the World Heavyweight Championship, between defedning champion Edge against John Cena & Big Show. The third main event was The Undertaker versus Shawn Michaels. Featured matches on the undercard included, Jeff Hardy versus Matt Hardy in an Extreme Rules match, Chris Jericho versus the team of Roddy Piper, Ricky Steamboat and Jimmy Snuka, and the annual Money in the Bank ladder match featuring Kane, MVP, Mark Henry, Shelton Benjamin, Kofi Kingston, CM Punk, Christian, & Finlay. With an attendance of 72,744, it is the 6th largest attendance in WrestleMania history.
Leonard Shelby is tracking down the man who raped and murdered his wife. The difficulty of locating his wife's killer, however, is compounded by the fact that he suffers from a rare, untreatable form of short-term memory loss. Although he can recall details of life before his accident, Leonard cannot remember what happened fifteen minutes ago, where he's going, or why.
Set in 1977, back when sex was safe, pleasure was a business and business was booming, idealistic porn producer Jack Horner aspires to elevate his craft to an art form. Horner discovers Eddie Adams, a hot young talent working as a busboy in a nightclub, and welcomes him into the extended family of movie-makers, misfits and hangers-on that are always around. Adams' rise from nobody to a celebrity adult entertainer is meteoric, and soon the whole world seems to know his porn alter ego, "Dirk Diggler". Now, when disco and drugs are in vogue, fashion is in flux and the party never seems to stop, Adams' dreams of turning sex into stardom are about to collide with cold, hard reality.
Kathleen Madigan drops in on Detroit to deliver material derived from time spent with her Irish Catholic Midwest family, eating random pills out of her mother's purse, touring Afghanistan, and her love of John Denver and the Lunesta butterfly.
Returning wounded from the war Maksym was overcome by self-doubt, in his physiological state. He is undergoing rehabilitation. He loses contact with his wife. He is tormented by dreams. In one of his dreams Maksym goes to the island to catch a lot of fish, as the paramedic advised him. Maksym takes a boat, net, dynamite from the best man and sails to the island.
Spanning over one thousand years, and three parallel stories, The Fountain is a story of love, death, spirituality, and the fragility of our existence in this world.
Car Men is a collaboration between the renowned choreographer Jíri Kylían and filmmaker Boris Paval Conen. Based on the opera 'CARMEN' by Georges Bizet they shot a hilarious and poetic short film in the destroyed landscape of a Czech brown coal mine. The actors in this film are older dancers from Kylían's troupe (around 50 years old) and the main prop is a 'TATRA 87', a famous car from 1937.
This is a good video of "Figaro", but there are a couple of better ones available. The Bohm and the Pappano are better still due to the female members of the casts. The reason for buying this one is the "Figaro", Bryn Terfel. No one can top him today in that role. John Eliot Gardiner also stands out. Many of us have voiced their opinion that If the Metropolitan Opera would release it's 1998 version, that would be the one to get.
All the throbbing eroticism—and ultimate heartbreak—of Puccini’s youthful score is unleashed by James Levine and his top-flight cast. Plácido Domingo is Des Grieux, the handsome, headstrong young aristocrat who falls head over heels for the enticing, impetuous Manon Lescaut (Renata Scotto). Manon returns his love, but her obsession with luxury ruins them both. Gian Carlo Menotti’s opulent production, with sets and costumes by Desmond Heeley, superbly captures the colorful world of 18th century France.
When Barbe-bleue loses his fifth wife, the turbulent Boulotte is selected at random to be the next one. But Barbe-Bleue falls in love with Hermia – who loves the shepherd Saphir – and soon wearies of Boulotte. So, he asks his alchemist to concoct for him an “anti-wife” philtre. But, as on the previous occasions, it is merely a sleeping potion and Boulotte wakes up the other five “dead” wives. They reappear, dressed up as gypsies and bring the truth to light.
At the beginning of 1964, the music world experiences something completely unexpected. Maria Callas returns to the opera stage as the prima donna. Her “Tosca” at the Royal Opera House becomes a sensation. Maria Callas wants to show everyone once again that she deserves the title of “prima donna assoluta.” On the condition that star director Franco Zeffirelli take over the direction, the exceptional singer agrees to sing the role of Tosca. The BBC recorded the 2nd act of the opera for television. It is one of the most dramatic acts in opera history: in order to free the painter Cavaradossi from the hands of torturers, Tosca ends up murdering the police chief Scarpia. The film footage is one of the rare opportunities to see Maria Callas in an opera performance and to experience her highly emotional performance art and vocal abilities...
La traviata (Italian: [la traˈviaːta], "The Fallen Woman"[1][2]) is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias (1852), a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The opera was originally entitled Violetta, after the main character. It was first performed on 6 March 1853 at the La Fenice opera house in Venice. Piave and Verdi wanted to follow Dumas in giving the opera a contemporary setting, but the authorities at La Fenice insisted that it be set in the past, "c. 1700". It was not until the 1880s that the composer and librettist's original wishes were carried out and "realistic" productions were staged.[3]
Who loves whom in Così fan tutte, Mozart’s and Da Ponte’s cruelly comic reflection on desire, fidelity and betrayal? Or have the confusions to which the main characters subject one another ensured that in spite of the heartfelt love duets and superficially fleetfooted comedy nothing will work any longer and that a sense of emotional erosion has replaced true feelings? Così fan tutte is a timeless work full of questions that affect us all. The Academy Award-winning director Michael Haneke once said that he was merely being precise and did not want to distort reality. In only his second opera production after Don Giovanni in 2006, he presents what ARTE described as a “disillusioned vision of love in an ice-cold, realistic interpretation”.
This is Laurent Pelly’s Théâtre des Champs-Élysées staging of Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia, with a cast featuring Florian Sempey as Figaro, Catherine Trottmann as Rosina, and Michele Angelini as Il Conte Almaviva. Jérémie Rhorer conducts Le Cercle de l-Harmonie.
Weber was at the forefront of the rise of German Romantic opera and sought to dethrone Rossini from his position as the leading operatic composer in Europe. In his breakthrough and most popular opera Der Freischütz (The Marksman) composed in 1821, he succeeded in his aim of establishing a truly German form. Turning to the folklore and folk songs of his native land he took a story of a marksman who makes a pact with the Devil, vesting it with powerful intensity not least in the famous Wolfs Glen scene and an astonishing control of orchestral color and atmosphere.
Britten's last opera, in two acts, presented by Teatro Real.
Composer Thomas Adès conducts the Met premiere of his powerful opera based on Shakespeare’s last play, in Robert Lepage’s brilliantly inventive production. Simon Keenlyside is the magician Prospero, who conjures the storm that shipwrecks his enemies and sets in motion the course of events. Rising Met stars Isabel Leonard and Alek Shrader are the young lovers, Miranda and Ferdinand, Alan Oke sings the sinister Caliban, and Audrey Luna gives a memorable performance as the sprite Ariel.
Director David McVicar’s new production brings opera’s favorite double bill to new life, setting the two operas in the same Sicilian setting, separated by two generations. Marcelo Álvarez takes on the rare feat of singing both leading tenor roles. In Cavalleria, he is Turiddu, the young man who abandons Santuzza (Eva-Maria Westbroek) in his pursuit of the married Lola (Ginger Costa-Jackson)—and ends up being killed in a duel with her husband, Alfio (George Gagnidze). In Pagliacci, Álvarez is Canio, the leader of a traveling vaudeville troupe. Patricia Racette sings Nedda, his unfaithful young wife, whose plans to run away with her lover are foiled by her spurned admirer Tonio (George Gagnidze)—with equally tragic consequences. Met Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi is on the podium.
Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, a ballet in three acts, is present by the Ballet Company of the National Opera of Ukraine, with music provided by the Orchestra of the National Opera of Ukraine, conducted by Mykola Dyadura
Star soprano Anna Netrebko created a sensation in her first Met performances as the malevolent Lady Macbeth, the central character in Verdi’s retelling of Shakespeare’s tragedy. She is joined by Željko Lucic, who brings dramatic intensity and vocal authority to the title role of the honest general driven to murder and deceit by his ambitious wife. René Pape is Banquo, Joseph Calleja is Macduff, and Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi presides over Adrian Noble’s atmospheric production.
The life and work of stage designer ADOLPHE APPIA, originator of the most profound agitations in contemporary theatre. Through the dynamic alternation of animated drawings and choreographies specially conceived for the film, we discover the steps of his artistic evolution.
Originally set in the 15th c century, Tchaikovsky's "The Enchantress" is updated to the present day in this innovative production. The charismatic, emancipated Nastasya, who rejects the advances of the devious Mamïrov, duly faces the implacable forces of traditional values in a society riven by divisions between liberal freedoms and religious orthodoxies. The tragic outcome engulfs everyone...
The 1987 Glyndebourne production of Ravel's L'enfant et les sortilèges, designed by Maurice Sendak and directed by Frank Corsaro.
Although he is unanimously credited with having democratised opera, making it accessible to the greatest number, focus is rarely put on the strategy he devised and implemented in order to carry out his actions, nor what his actions reveal of the man and artist, and of the resulting metamorphosis from opera singer to pop artist. Through this angle, this film sets out to pay tribute to the man who summed up his credo, obsession and life’s work, in the following way: “They led the public to believe that classical music belonged to a restricted elite. I was the way to prove to the world that was wrong.
The acclaimed Italian director, Emma Dante, presents a powerful, barbaric and at time frenzied Macbeth with great attention to detail. Staged and filmed in Italy's largest theatre, the Teatro Massimo in Palermo, Sicily, this production captures remarkable performances by the Italian soprano Anna Pirozzi as Lady Macbeth, the renowned Verdi specialist, baritone Roberto Frontali, in one of his signature roles, and the rising star, Croatian bass-baritone Marko Mimica as Banco (Banquo). The conductor, Gabriele Ferro, has opted to use the 1865 Paris version of the score, sung in Italian and without the ballets, for a production that received generous praise in Palermo and on tour.
Written for exceptional singers, Il Trovatore has remained popular ever since its first performance at the Teatro Apollo in Rome on 19 January 1853, when even the toughest critics were convinced of its place in the repertoire. People are attracted to Il Trovatore because of its rousing melodies, its brutal, powerful plot, and its simple structure: elements that make it one of the best examples of Verdi’s theatre pieces. Recorded live at the Sferisterio theatre of Macerata in the summer of 2016, under conductor Daniel Oren's vibrant and incisive direction, this production boasts a first-rate cast and elegant direction from Francisco Negrin. The sets and costumes by Louis Désiré and lighting by Bruno Poet were well received by the Sferisterio audience.