Frequently Bought Together
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Product details
|
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organise and find favourite items. |
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
An admirably candid portrait of Karajan and his passion for filming classical music.
His pursuit of an idealised beauty entered into the visual arena-eg.beards were banned, and the balding had to wear wigs.
As ever,a complex personality, full of contradicions emerges.Some of the relationships with film directors were rather strained but his generosity in other other areas comes across well.
-infact,I feel this is a classier appendix to the Dornhlem documentary on DG than EMI`s film (Karajan,a portrait) which is overly reverential.
His pursuit of an idealised beauty entered into the visual arena-eg.beards were banned, and the balding had to wear wigs.
As ever,a complex personality, full of contradicions emerges.Some of the relationships with film directors were rather strained but his generosity in other other areas comes across well.
-infact,I feel this is a classier appendix to the Dornhlem documentary on DG than EMI`s film (Karajan,a portrait) which is overly reverential.
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful
very good value for the money,probably the greatest conductor in the world simon rattle is not on t5he same planet!!!
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
2 reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
The demanding German conductor videotapes his own legacy.
19 Oct 2009
We learn early in this 58-minute German film made in 2008 that conductor Herbert Von Karajan had one heck of an ego. Everyone agrees to that. He was self-centered, tyrannical and very possessive. He wanted to also be rich. But all those interviewed - and there are folks on both sides of the conductor's admiration society - agree he was a powerful conductor, and Beethoven was his specialty.
What is not obvious from listening to his CD recordings is that the conductor was fascinated with technology, especially that of videotape. We see a brief clip (all we ever see are excerpts of two minutes or less) of him conducting the Berlin Philharmonic (where he was principal conductor for MANY years) in Japan. He realizes that the concert, which was broadcast, was performed in front of 3,000 people but 3 MILLION viewers were watching. It was then he decided that he would videotape his concerts and they would be his memorial for future generations after he died. He hired directors but was not happy with the way they shot the concerts, particularly not showing him in close-up often enough. So he learned all he could about movie making and directed himself - even using pre-recorded music! He made friends with the CEO and President of Sony and made many trips to visit their factory to get the latest video taping equipment. He was fanatical about this.
The film includes recent interviews with members of the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic orchestras, his film editor and his personal secretary. These are woven together with archival film of Von Karajan himself from various interviews before his death. The film, which has no separate narrator, contains subtitles. In the few cases where the interviewee is speaking in English, the words are spoken by someone else in German. The subtitles are easy to read.
The only supplements are brief previews of other Arthaus DVDs, one of which is the memorial concert for Von Karajan in Vienna. You can tell from this brief clip that the Von Karajan, himself, would not have been happy with the video; there are very few close-ups of the conductor and the camera angles would be, to him, all wrong.
As a viewer not as well versed as some in classical music, I found this film engaging and entertaining as well as informative.
Steve Ramm
"Anything Phonographic"
What is not obvious from listening to his CD recordings is that the conductor was fascinated with technology, especially that of videotape. We see a brief clip (all we ever see are excerpts of two minutes or less) of him conducting the Berlin Philharmonic (where he was principal conductor for MANY years) in Japan. He realizes that the concert, which was broadcast, was performed in front of 3,000 people but 3 MILLION viewers were watching. It was then he decided that he would videotape his concerts and they would be his memorial for future generations after he died. He hired directors but was not happy with the way they shot the concerts, particularly not showing him in close-up often enough. So he learned all he could about movie making and directed himself - even using pre-recorded music! He made friends with the CEO and President of Sony and made many trips to visit their factory to get the latest video taping equipment. He was fanatical about this.
The film includes recent interviews with members of the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic orchestras, his film editor and his personal secretary. These are woven together with archival film of Von Karajan himself from various interviews before his death. The film, which has no separate narrator, contains subtitles. In the few cases where the interviewee is speaking in English, the words are spoken by someone else in German. The subtitles are easy to read.
The only supplements are brief previews of other Arthaus DVDs, one of which is the memorial concert for Von Karajan in Vienna. You can tell from this brief clip that the Von Karajan, himself, would not have been happy with the video; there are very few close-ups of the conductor and the camera angles would be, to him, all wrong.
As a viewer not as well versed as some in classical music, I found this film engaging and entertaining as well as informative.
Steve Ramm
"Anything Phonographic"
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
More warts than usual
4 Dec 2009
Amazon Verified Purchase
This DVD is fascinating as it shows some of the (polite and less than polite) discussions between Karajan and his directors and editors. Other documentaries about Karajan show his absolute mania for control / perfection and tend to be one sided. This one shows how he developed his craft in the visual arts. There are good interviews with his directors, and the views are candid. There is acknowledgement to the trail blazing of Bernstein in the 'young peoples' concerts. The DVD is as technically assured as possible given the age and circumstances of the original material. The DVD is not a music DVD per se, but one that shows the development of a director.
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
- Film & TV > Documentary
- Film & TV > English Subtitles
- Film & TV > Musicals & Classical > Classical Music
- Film & TV > Musicals & Classical > Musicals & Stage Performances > Classic
- Film & TV > Musicals & Classical > Musicals & Stage Performances > Film Musicals
- Film & TV > Television > Music & Entertainment
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
