Don Giovanni Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		4.0

Don Giovanni Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 13, 2013

Don Giovanni is the stuff of nightmares, and not just with regard to its titular character and his desolute lifestyle. My first year college Music Theory final required us to “analyze” (i.e., account for all the harmonies functionally in traditional Roman numeral form) Don Giovanni’s massive final scene, a scene which includes some remarkably forward thinking writing on the part of Mozart, as well as some insanely complex stretching of traditional tonal boundaries, especially in the “ghost” sequence when the Commendatore comes to wreak vengeance on the hapless anti-hero. (I should add that I had all of 45 minutes or so to complete this daunting assignment.) You don’t have to be an analyst to understand on an almost intuitive level Mozart’s rather unexpected treatment of this infamous material, managing to not only capture an inherent moral ambiguity but also, via Lorenzo Da Ponte’s well crafted libretto, investing what is at its core a tragedy with several rather enjoyable comedic elements. The ironic thing here is that Mozart himself branded Don Giovanni an opera buffa, i.e., a comedy (maybe even an outright farce), but few who have ever seen the work would deny its inexorably dramatic scope, especially in the final moments when Giovanni gets a rather startling comeuppance (or in this case comedownance). The high definition era has brought a glut of live performances of operas to music aficionados’ home theaters, but there have been perhaps surprisingly few feature film versions of operas through the years. Olive Films released the 1984 film version of Carmen back in 2011, and now they’ve returned to the operatic fold with this occasionally problematic but often quite sumptuous 1979 Joseph Losey film of one of Mozart’s most iconic achievements. Purists may well have issues with some elements of this filmic reimagining, but those who don’t mind a little tweaking here and there for the sake of a different medium (something that was also done in the aforementioned Carmen, by the way) will find this outing to be visually spectacular and musically quite excellent. If it's not the stuff of outright dreams, it's certainly miles away from any nightmare scenario.

Joseph Losey is a name that may not be that familiar to younger film fans, but he had a long and rather fascinating career, one that was, as with so many others in his generation, rudely interrupted by the early fifties’ so-called “Red Scare”, when all sorts of people were accused of being Communists, even if they had had little to no relationship with formal Communism other than a tendency to be left leaning. Losey escaped “official” blacklisting, but even as a “graylisted” director, he found work in the United States next to impossible, and he spent the bulk of his professional career in England, where he ultimately became known for his long and fruitful collaboration with Harold Pinter. Losey is perhaps best remembered nowadays for his three films which Pinter wrote, The Servant, a fascinating psychological drama which won several BAFTAs; Accident, an examination of a mid-life crisis which was way ahead of its time but which nonetheless won the Jury Award at Cannes the year it was released; and The Go-Between, a period drama which kind of presages the Merchant-Ivory films, but which is considerably heavier in tone, and which also did well at Cannes and which features an absolutely ravishing score by Michel Legrand.

Losey had evidently long wanted to film Don Giovanni, but according to several published reports, rather surprisingly he had never actually seen the opera on stage. He brings a rather fresh visual ingenuity to this project, utilizing some palatial Italian locations to extremely good advantage throughout the film. (Purists decried that Don Giovanni is after all a Spanish story, but the change in venue is really nothing major to complain about.) Losey opens the film up rather well, including sequences shot outdoors. The one issue some may have with Losey’s approach is that in some of the instrumental sequences (notably the prelude), Losey’s images don’t meld especially well with the musical content. The opening music of Don Giovanni is almost an allegro giacoso, but Losey offers languid, almost stationary, scenes that seem rather ill suited to what we’re actually listening to.

Losey’s camera becomes almost a dancer at times, weaving in and out of labyrinthine halls and following various characters on their appointed rounds. From a pure production design standpoint, this is one incredibly sumptuous looking outing, with beautiful costumes and makeup blending artfully in with the “found” locations that Losey so admirably utilizes. Whatever slight changes Losey has made to the original source material become understandable as this version repeatedly reimagines scenes for the medium of film. It can in fact be rather instructive for those who really love this property to compare Losey’s version with any of the many Blu-ray outings of Don Giovanni that simply offer staged versions of the opera.

The film has a rather well heeled cast, including Ruggero Raimondi as Don Giovanni, John Macurdy as The Commendatore, Edda Moser as Donna Edda, Kiri Te Kanawa as Donna Elvira and José Van Dam as Leporello. Lorin Maazel conducts the orchestra and chorus of the Paris Opera in a musically enjoyable if not especially nuanced interpretation (part of which may simply be due to the exigencies of prereording the score). However, the most interesting credit is for someone who evidently helped fashion this version as well as providing the charming illustrations that run under the credits sequence. A few years before Amadeus made a certain surname infamous, this Don Giovanni repeatedly credits one Frantz Salieri. It’s enough to make even non-believers think twice about dismissing obviously divinely inspired events as mere coincidence.

Don Giovanni Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Don Giovanni is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.66:1. This is one of the nicer looking catalog releases that Olive is offering this month. Elements are in really good shape, with only extremely minor specks occasionally showing up. The colors here are very appealing and accurate looking, and close-ups reveal excellent fine detail (to the point where you can actually make out individual applications of powdered makeup). Some of the interior scenes have minor issues with shadow detail, but the outdoor locations pop quite well, with appealing contrast and solid, consistent black levels.

Don Giovanni Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Don Giovanni is one of the few Olive Films releases that I can recall which offers more than one audio option. Both a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix as well as DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 stereo fold down are available on this Blu-ray disc, and both offer superior fidelity with very good reproduction of both the orchestra and vocalists. Losey adds to the "realistic" approach he opts for by introducing some minor ambient sound effects that are quite artfully mixed underneath the music, and while they're not distracting in the 2.0 mix, some may want to opt for the 5.1 mix if for no other reason than that this version prioritizes things a little bit more sensibly. Under such a controlled environment as a film shoot, with its necessary pre-recording, one wouldn't expect there to be any balance issues, and in fact there are none in either mix. Fidelity remains excellent and dynamic range, while not huge, easily encompasses everything from hushed soli to more boisterous tutti passages.

Don Giovanni Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no supplements included on this Blu-ray disc.

Don Giovanni Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There are a number of really excellent live performances of Don Giovanni available on Blu-ray, and lovers of this piece would be well advised to get at least one of them to watch alongside this often quite well done film version. Yes, there are some elements that have been tweaked and/or lost in this version, but quite a bit has been gained in Losey's admirably constructed film, one which smartly opens up the story while never losing the intimacy of Don Giovanni's descent into moral turpitude. Visually this film is quite sumptuous and the soundtrack offers some stellar singing and playing as well. Even those who don't really consider themselves opera fans may well want to check out this version of Mozart's beautiful masterpiece. Recommended.