

Aging opera singer Maria Callas tries to make a comeback by performing in a production of Bizet's "Carmen."


Bruna

Aging opera singer Maria Callas tries to make a comeback by performing in a production of Bizet's "Carmen."
2002-09-18
6.4
A triumph is worse than a failure if the price is too high
6.2Clare and Aidan make a pact to break up before college — no regrets, no broken hearts. But will one epic goodbye date offer them a last chance at love?
7.3A widow with three children hires a handyman to fix her house during a major storm. When not doing home repairs, he shares his philosophy of believing in the power of the universe to deliver what we want.
7.4Bridger is a young outsider who's always wanted more. He and his mother flee an abusive home, eventually finding a small town in the middle of nowhere. Once there, Bridger finds true acceptance with another misfit.
6.7Three angels bestow the gift of song to a young girl, who must follow a series of rules in order hold on to it during her rise to fame and fortune.
8.2A 17 year old finds out that his girlfriend is dying, so he sets out to give her an entire life, in the last year she has left.
6.8A young woman's penchant for sensational Gothic novels leads to misunderstandings in the matters of the heart.
7.8It was a chance meeting started by one of Sol’s friends trying to chat up Jennifer. However, in the end, it was those two who hit it off. Sol enjoyed Jen’s smile, her effort, and how silly she could be. Jen enjoyed Sol’s cooking, his athleticism, and that he would join her in fun moments. As you can imagine, love bloomed, and things got serious. Jen’s investment in Sol led to her pushing him to follow his dreams and even move in to save money. Sol’s investment in Jen well, it led to him proposing. But what started as a liver tumor grew into full-on cancer, so with a diagnosis of 6 months to live, Sol and Jennifer try to make the best of it.
6.0Maud Bailey, a brilliant English academic, is researching the life and work of poet Christabel La Motte. Roland Michell is an American scholar in London to study Randolph Henry Ash, now best-known for a collection of poems dedicated to his wife. When Maud and Roland discover a cache of love letters that appear to be from Ash to La Motte, they follow a trail of clues across England, echoing the journey of the couple over a century earlier.
6.3An unlikely friendship evolves over one wild night in LA between a struggling journalist and actor Hervé Villechaize, the world's most famous gun-toting dwarf, resulting in life-changing consequences for both.
6.1Captives of the very relationships that define and sustain them, nine women resiliently meet the travails and disappointments of life.
6.9A privileged girl and a charismatic boy's instant desire sparks a love affair made only more reckless by parents trying to keep them apart.
6.3Thomas Montgomery, a married father of two young daughters, gets seduced by the world of online gambling and chat rooms where a virtual romance and sexual obsession ultimately leads to the murder of an innocent man.
6.2A struggling construction worker and an aspiring musician find themselves falling in love.
8.0An aspiring musician agrees to a marriage of convenience with a soon-to-deploy Marine, but a tragedy soon turns their fake relationship all too real.
6.2A young woman who is determined to maintain her independence finds herself at odds with her family who wants her to tame her wild side and get married.
6.3A car accident and shifting affections test the bond between a married couple.
6.9In early 19th century England, Mr and Mrs Bennet's five unmarried daughters vie for the affections of rich and eligible Mr Bingley and his status-conscious friend, Mr Darcy, who have moved into their neighbourhood. While Bingley takes an immediate liking to eldest daughter Jane, Darcy has difficulty adapting to local society and repeatedly clashes with second-eldest Elizabeth.
6.3In a small coastal California town, Henry and Nicky are pals from blue collar families with only a short time before they ship off to World War II. Henry begins romancing new-to-town Caddie Winger, believing her to be wealthy. Mischievous and irresponsible, Nicky gets into trouble which forces the other two to become involved, testing their relationship, as well as the friendship between the boys.
0.0Famed countertenor Andreas Scholl sings the title role of Roman emperor Julius Caesar in this memorable production of Georg Friederich Handel's "Giulio Cesare," staged at the Royal Danish Opera. Transporting the action from ancient times to the present day, director Francisco Negrin paints a passionate portrait of Caesar's storied romance with the Egyptian queen Cleopatra (played by soprano Inger Dam-Jensen).
7.0The grand scale and magnificent acoustics of the Roman arena in Verona are ideally suited to the pageantry of Verdi's Egyptian opera, presented here in a staging that is true to the original 1913 production, framed by obelisks and sphinxes and filled with chorus and dancers. Chinese soprano Hui He has won international acclaim for her portrayal of the eponymous slave girl whose forbidden love for the war hero Radamés (Marco Berti, the experienced Verdi tenor) brings death to them both.
Side by side in a leafy suburb, Thom lives in one flat, Alethea in another. It's pretty clear that their respective, unsatisfying lives would improve enormously if they just met each other. But with a wall literally between them, this seems highly improbable. Then there's the building's Power Box, having an existential crisis about the eventual collapse of the universe, and the super nova from five thousand years ago. Then there's time travelling on an equation for the speed of light and too much sugar. There's demon magpie attacks, laptops in love, cats dancing to Prince and sock puppet nightmares. And a tiny prayer by the Wall, hoping that all of these pieces can come together for one magical moment of love.
0.0In Rigoletto, the deformed figure of the hunchbacked jester at the Mantuan court acts as a foil to his cynical and powerful master, an unscrupulous philanderer contrasted with his cruel and unforgiving fool. Rigoletto encourages and welcomes the Duke's conquests, pitilessly mocking his victims until he discovers that the Duke has abducted the one person he genuinely loves, his own daughter. As a result, the character of the court jester is transformed into a tragic figure who, in spite of his evident immorality and malice, allows us to sense the devotion he feels for his daughter and his horror at being destroyed by the same despotic world as that which he himself has helped to create.
6.5This filmed version of Strauss' shocker features Teresa Stratas as opera's most depraved teenager, and she's as perfect a Salome as one would ever hope to see or hear. Stratas inhabits the role, exploring the character's sensuousness as she vainly woos Jochanaan, her venomous hatred when she's rejected, the crazed look in her eyes when she demands his head--on a silver platter, no less. Such complete identification with a role, especially of a character so malignant helps make this 1974 Salome stand out among the many fine DVDs of the opera.
8.0A lonely mother and her son go to the opera where a performance of Cherubini’s opera Medea is given. It is the mother’s birthday and she wanted to surprise her son by inviting him to the opera. But, the son’s plan were different and he is quite upset about it. His mother tries to break the silent barrier behind which he hides. A semblance of discussion begins, not without humour. Tension is present but, as the performance goes on, both find themselves astounded, captured, alone in the opera house.
5.8An introspective dentist's suspicions about his wife's infidelity stresses his mental well being and family life to the breaking point.
8.1The gorgeous and evocative Otto Schenk/Günther Schneider-Siemssen production continues with this second opera in Wagner’s Ring cycle. Hildegard Behrens brings deep empathy to Brünnhilde, the favorite daughter of the god Wotan (James Morris) who nevertheless defies him. Morris’s portrayal of Wotan is deservedly legendary, as is Christa Ludwig, as Fricka. Jessye Norman and Gary Lakes are Sieglinde and Siegmund, and Kurt Moll is the threatening Hunding. James Levine and the Met orchestra provide astonishing color and drama. (Performed April 8, 1989)
6.7Pleasantly plump teenager Tracy Turnblad auditions to be on Baltimore's most popular dance show - The Corny Collins Show - and lands a prime spot. Through her newfound fame, she becomes determined to help her friends and end the racial segregation that has been a staple of the show.
5.9Visionary artist Matthew Barney returns to cinema with this 3-part epic, a radical reinvention of Norman Mailer’s novel Ancient Evenings. In collaboration with composer Jonathan Bepler, Barney combines traditional modes of narrative cinema with filmed elements of performance, sculpture, and opera, reconstructing Mailer’s hypersexual story of Egyptian gods and the seven stages of reincarnation, alongside the rise and fall of the American car industry.
6.5Mélanie Prouvost, a ten-year-old butcher's daughter, is a gifted pianist. That is why she and her parents decide that she sit for the Conservatory entrance exam. Although Mélanie is very likely to be admitted, she unfortunately gets distracted by the president of the jury's offhand attitude and she fails. Ten years later, Mélanie becomes her page turner, waiting patiently for her revenge.
8.5This production was originally staged for the Pepsico Summerfare Festival, The International Performing Arts Festival of the State University of New York at Purchase. Leaving the lyrics in their original Italian, acclaimed American director Peter Sellars transports Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's "Don Giovanni" to a modern-day metropolis, nestling the opera's beloved characters among the brownstones of New York City's Harlem. Sellars's contemporary retelling of a classic musical tale is one of three performances in a Mozart series that also includes "Le Nozze di Figaro" and "'Così Fan Tutte."
8.0This first film of Cyprus' first director, Giorgios Filis, depicts music and dance customs in the form and style of a folk opera, with traditional Cypriot dances and songs. The film consists of a folkloric inventory based on the folk culture of Cyprus, as well as on similar ritual happenings. The narration and dialogue are entirely in the Cypriot dialect and are characterized by a rhetorical and poetic mood.
6.6The life and career of Italian opera singer Farinelli, considered one of the greatest castrato singers of all time.
6.1A former champion rodeo rider is reduced to using his saddle skills to promote a breakfast cereal in a gaudy Las Vegas show. When he's asked to perform with a $12 million horse, he discovers it is being doped to remain docile. He flees into the desert astride the beast in an act of defiance. A story-hungry female reporter gives chase.
7.0A Ukrainian comic opera with spoken dialogue in three acts with music and libretto by the composer Semen Hulak-Artemovsky (1813–1873). The orchestration has subsequently been rewritten by composers such as Reinhold Glière and Heorhiy Maiboroda. This is one of the best-known Ukrainian comic operas depicting national themes.
4.5A young woman, married to a wealthy man, but miserably lonely; trapped within a world ruled with an iron fist. Katerina is driven by a lust for life and for love. Her husband, though, is impotent; her father-in-law a tyrant. No wonder, then, that she longs to free herself from this yoke. When Sergei starts work on the family estate, she sees in him a chance for salvation. However, their subsequent affair marks the beginning of a descent into crime.
8.0The Queen of the Night enlists a handsome prince named Tamino to rescue her beautiful kidnapped daughter, Princess Pamina. Aided by the lovelorn bird hunter Papageno and a magical flute that holds the power to change the hearts of men, young Tamino embarks on a quest for true love, leading to the evil Sarastro's temple where Pamina is held captive.