Mozart - The Magic Flute [VHS]

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Product details

Actor: Helene Friberg, Jane Darling, Jerker Arvidson, Nina Harte, Sven-Erik Jacobsson
Primary Contributor: Josef K?stlinger
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Subtitled); Swedish (Original Language), Analog
Format: Classical, Color, NTSC
Running Time: 135 minutes
Release Date: 1995-09-26
Audience Rating: G (General Audience)
Publisher: Homevision
Studio: Homevision

VHS Movie Reviews of Mozart - The Magic Flute [VHS]

Movie Review: Apalling!
Summary: 1 Stars

I'm in the minority here. Upon the recommendation of someone who is clearly no judge of opera, I rented this - fortunately. The looping was most disturbing and the voices were inadequate - and that's being complimentary.

The Tamino was quite beautiful asleep - awake, he was less so and even more boring, a pale Prince Valiant with neither voice nor animation.

As an admirer of Bergman, I cringe over this travesty.

Movie Review: Magical
Summary: 5 Stars

I had never seen a real opera before. I discount "Jesus Christ Superstar" and a few other rock operas I've seen. I had wondered how I would enjoy the real thing and I decided to hedge my bets by using Ingmar Bergman's production of "The Magic Flute". I had seen enough of his movies to know that he regularly exceeds my expectations. I admit that I was curious about the way the film started. The focus on an audience focussed on an unseen stage was different. However, it didn't take long to be drawn to the frequent and compelling attention of a young girl in the audience. In time she became the lone representative of the audience and it was her expressions that served the director's purpose so well. It was like the laugh track on a two-bit sit-com except that this was OPERA and the encouragement was on a much higher level. The young girl's almost constant expression conveyed to me interest, appreciation, comprehension and enjoyment. I found myself having the same expression on my face during the majority of the movie.
Oh! and speaking of the movie; well, I really enjoyed it. I recognized the overture and I really enjoyed the first series of sequences. There was a joy and excitement that the orchestra and the singers conveyed in the music that I found invigorating. However, the opera had its' dour tones as the elements of adversity encroached on the plot. The music during these stretches did not equal the level that was achieved during the joyous scenes. I couldn't help but notice a declining level of interest but the movie ended well and I particularly enjoyed the "Popagano/Popagana" duet. I rented this movie but I will probably buy it because it's worth seeing again.

On a closing note, I saw a number of reviews that complained about aspects of the film that only an opera fan would focus on. I rated this production as a film and not an opera. Despite a few slow spots, this is a very good musical film.

Movie Review: Even if you are not a fan of opera
Summary: 5 Stars

Even if you are not normally a fan of opera, you can't help but love The Magic Flute. Bergman's film, Trollfl?jten, is a clever mix of stagecraft and film effects, and a delightful introduction to this wonderful work. Although not sung in the original German, it still captures the beauty of Mozart's music and the complexities of the story--the meaning of which is still debated after all these years. His Papageno and Papagena are unforgettable, and Birgit Nordin is near perfect as the Queen of the Night. As Hermann Hesse had one of his characters say about The Magic Flute: "(it) presents life to us as a wondrous song...it preaches optimism and faith."

Movie Review: My Budding Little Opera Singer!
Summary: 5 Stars

A few years back, I was thrilled to see this Swedish production of The Magic Flute on television. It touched me so, first because I had worked on costume-making for a college production - Luther College, Decorah, Iowa back in the late '70s and was introduced to the opera for the first time then; and, second, because this production, being in Swedish, made me realize how much Norwegian I still retained from my childhood - from my Mother's Norwegian/Saami family. I ordered it and played it for my then 4-year-old youngest grandchild - Laynie. She was obviously moved by the scene - and the Aria sung by The Queen of the Night. We since discovered many versions of this Aria on YouTube, which my little one has placed on her very own playlist and along with which she sings in her very own operatic style, bursting into the opening strains on any elevator, once the doors shut and stopping abruptly when the doors open. Note: the elevator rides are mostly one floor in a building where she insists on taking it instead of the stairs! She has discovered that an elevator - like singing in the bath - has great accoustics! We view the video throughout the holiday season and will do so each year.

Movie Review: Disappointing soloists
Summary: 3 Stars

Josef Kostlinger as Tamino is barely adequate and Birgit Nordin as Queen of the Night is a major disappointment. A world class soprano is required to handle the Queen of the Night's difficult arias. Hakan Hagegard is superb as Papageno. Irma Urrila performs very well as Pamina. Apart from Hagegard, the star of the show is the Swedish Radio Chair conducted by Eric Ericson.

All in all, a pleasant enough Magic Flute, if you like it performed in Swedish. My perfect Magic Flute would be James Levine's Metropolitan Opera recording of the Magic Flute. I would keep all of his soloists (especially Kathleen Battle as Pamina and Kurt Moll as Sarastro), but replace the Metropolitan Opera Chorus with the Swedish Radio Choir or the Stockholm Chamber Choir. These choirs produce a full, rich sound without the heavy, annoying vibrato that comes from the Metropolitan Opera Chorus.

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Summary of Mozart - The Magic Flute [VHS]

Ingmar Bergman's Magic Flute is a magical adaptation of Mozart's last opera. The tale of two star-crossed lovers--and an impish man whose greatest desire is to find a wife--unfolds through Mozart's glorious score. With all the urgency of a live performance, it is the most successful popularization of an opera to date.

Ingmar Bergman's vision of The Magic Flute (sung here in Swedish) remains one of the indisputable classics in the opera-as-film catalog, its charm and enchantment undiminished since the film's initial release in the 1970s. This is a case not of competition between two geniuses (and two media) but of affirmative, graceful, and enlightening synergy. Instead of simply filming a staged run-through of the opera, Bergman chooses to play with the framework around such a performance (given in Stockholm's elegant Drottningholm Theatre)--and he moreover rearranges the order of the scenes in the final act. Intermittent shots of audience reactions--including those of a young girl infectiously involved in the story--and sudden, psychologically probing close-up angles result in a richly textured, multilayered effect.

Certainly Bergman renders the fairy-tale aspects of Mozart's mise-en-sc?ne with such buoyant detail that the film makes an excellent entr?e both for youngsters and for anyone who is uneasy about how to approach an opera. Yet there is much food for thought to be savored by the already initiated as well. One of Bergman's more brilliant interventions is to depict Sarastro and the Queen of the Night as a divorced couple engaged in a bitter battle over daughter Pamina. The director supplies plenty of energetic wit and arabesques of allusion (in addition to his Prospero-like demeanor, the high priest Sarastro is shown at one point during the intermission perusing the score of Parsifal), and--as might be expected of one of film's greatest symbolists--teases out the opera's weightier allegorical levels with hauntingly beautiful effect. Brilliant chiaroscuro and contrasted lighting patterns, for example, offer ongoing visual commentary on the contest between darkness and light. The cast is exceptionally photogenic, their abundant youth and obvious chemistry more than compensating for the often no-more-than-mediocre vocal performances (with the exception of H?kan Hageg?rd's utterly disarming, still-fresh portrayal of Papageno). For a desert-island audio recording, try Thomas Beecham. --Thomas May

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