Description:
Sergei Prokofiev Yuri Grigorovich - Ivan The Therrible (2005) [DVD9 NTSC]
Video: 16:9 NTSC
Audio: LPCM Stereo, DD 5.0, DTS 5.0
Linear Notes: English, German, French
# Actors: Nicolas Le Riche, Riche, Paquette, Abbagnato, Vello Pahn
# Number of discs: 1
# Studio: Tdk DVD Video
# DVD Release Date: October 18, 2005
# Run Time: 114 minutes
.: Tracklist :.
Sergei Eisenstein's grand unfinished 1940s-50s film trilogy 'Ivan the Terrible' had elaborate incidental music by Sergei Prokofiev. In 1975 Yuri Grigorovich, for thirty years the chief choreographer of Moscow's Bolshoi Ballet, made a ballet on the same subject and used a conflation of Prokofiev's music from the film. It was quickly taken up by ballet companies the world over. This DVD is a film of a performance recorded live at the Opéra National de Paris in December 2003 and featuring three premier dancers of that company in the solo roles of Ivan, Anastasia and Kurbsky. The stage is filled at times with as many as eighty dancers as boyars, oprichniks (Ivan's personal police, assassins actually), maidens from whom Ivan picks his bride, and 'the Russian people.'
The character of Tsar Ivan, who was born in 1530, is a complicated one. On the one hand, he is considered a hero of sorts by Russians because he brought the disparate parts of Russia under one rule and virtually formed the nation. But his name is also synonymous with cruelty and paranoia. In the ballet Grigorovich tries to present both sides of Ivan, and in particular makes the point that Ivan was driven to his vicious behavior by the murder of his bride by boyars who hoped to take advantage of his ill-health (from which, in the ballet, he miraculously recovers in order to wreak havoc on his enemies). Consequently, in this narrative ballet, we have scenes of surpassing tenderness between Ivan and Anastasia, and others of a warlike nature.
The lovely Eleonora Abbagnata dances Anastasia with grace and gentleness. Both her solo scenes (as in 'Anastasia deep in thought') and her pas de deux with Ivan (as in 'Meeting between Ivan and Anastasia' and the dream scene which is a pas de deux between Ivan and the ghost of Anastasia) are sublime. Karl Paquette as Kurbsky, who is Ivan's early rival for Anastasia, but later his friend, has a bravura role which he dances brilliantly. But best of all is the electrifying Nicolas Le Riche as Ivan. A tall, handsome man, he is a fine actor who portrays Ivan's many emotions tellingly, and an even finer dancer in both his solos (e.g., 'Ivan's happiness' and 'Ivan mourns for Anastasia') and the aforementioned pas de deux with Anastasia. The corps de ballets, and particularly the men, are excellent. One could quibble a bit about Grigorovich's choreography which can seem trite and even laughably gauche at times. Grigorovich is no Balanchine.
Costumes are lavish and lovely. Scenery is rather plain but quite effective. The orchestra of the Paris Opéra is conducted rather routinely in Prokofiev's often brutal score by Vallo Pähn. (If you're primarily interested in the music qua music, get Fedoseyev's riveting account on Nimbus.) Still, the overall impression is engaging and certainly the narrative carries one forward breathlessly to the end.
.: Other Files :.
log+cue+m3u+cover
|
-