Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		4.0

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 4, 2024

What could two famous composers, one whose family converted from Judaism to Christianity and the other who is still cited as a virulent anti-Semite, possibly have in common? Well, if you had anything approaching a traditional wedding ceremony, chances are things got off to a start with the "Bridal Chorus" from Richard Wagner's Lohengrin accompanying a certain person walking down the aisle, and then at the end after everything's been sealed with a kiss, ended with a rousing rendition of the "Wedding March" from Felix Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream. That may be one of those peculiar trivia questions that delight musicologists in particular, but there's a whole other "trivial pursuit" aspect to Felix Mendelssohn's history vis a vis an older sibling, though in reality it may not actually be all that "trivial". Rather like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart before him, Mendelssohn had an older sister who was also an extremely accomplished musician, a woman who, again very much like Maria Anna Mozart, was typically relegated to the enormous shadow cast by her more famous brother. While there's some documentary evidence indicating Maria was herself a composer in addition to her keyboard facility, as of the writing of this review none of Maria's works have been discovered. Things are quite different with regard to Mendelssohn's sister Fanny (who was known as Fanny Hensel after her marriage), as completely unusual as it was during that era, Fanny actually had some of her work officially published during her lifetime.

This really engaging documentary is the brainchild of Fanny's great great great granddaughter Sheila Hayman, who is on hand here as a veritable "tour guide" and narrator as she introduces various people who have been (sorry, pun unavoidable) instrumental in rehabilitating Fanny's musical legacy. While Fanny did have some work published during her lifetime (an unbelievable accomplishment, considering the times), her music and even her life story became nothing more than a footnote to Felix's own story until around 1970, rather incredibly. That's when then nascent "feminism" got some early researchers interested in Fanny, and over the course of the ensuing decades, not only were more of Fanny's works made public and, yes, published, a rather fun "detective story" developed with regard to a piece that had been attributed to Felix but which has since been proven to be Fanny's, an investigation that is covered in some detail here.

As much as Fanny's music, which is offered here at least in snippets, deserves being celebrated, what may really resonate with modern day sensibilities is Fanny's "plight" of being an abundantly gifted and intelligent woman in a time when women, like children, were supposed to be seen and not heard, and then only within the context of being a wife and mother. Rather incredibly, the entire Mendelssohn clan, including Felix, seemed hell bent on preventing Fanny from having any sort of public performance career, though a late tour of Italy when Fanny was around 40 made her something of a superstar and quickly led to offers from publishers for her compositions, something she accepted despite some apparent umbrage on the part of Felix. Tragically, Fanny died very shortly after this triumph, followed rather quickly by Felix himself.

There's some rather provocative material here with regard to "traditional" gender roles and how talented females from days of yore (at least) have been undervalued. One particularly interesting sidebar comes during that aforementioned "investigation", which follows the attempts to rightly indicate that an Easter Sonata ascribed to Felix was actually the work of Fanny. A brief interview with a record producer whose recording of the sonata decades ago helped lead to the correct attribution finds him absolutely unwilling to concede that the work could be Fanny's, since the music, to him, is so obviously "masculine".

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Mercury Studios with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This is an appealing presentation that features generally excellent detail levels and a naturally suffused palette. Some of the material featuring Sheila Hayman seems deliberately soft focus in close-ups, and there is some interstitial stock footage at times which is rather rough looking, but on the whole this has a sleek, nicely defined, digital capture look that offers rather nice fine detail on things like the texture of vellum manuscript paper and the like. There's some very brief banding apparent in the "new, improved" Mercury Studios masthead, but I didn't see any compression issues in the actual feature.

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn features DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and LPCM 2.0 options, and you can't really go wrong with either of them. The surround track frankly doesn't have a ton of opportunities for overwhelming immersive activity, but you can definitely hear things open up in moments like the late piano recital of Fanny's Easter Sonata. Otherwise, this is a pretty talk heavy affair and both the stereo and surround tracks offer perfectly capable support for all spoken elements. There are optional subtitles in English, French, German and Italian, as well as automatic English subtitles in a few passing moments of French.

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no supplements on the disc. The cardboard sleeve includes two pockets, one for a Blu-ray disc, and the other for an included DVD copy.

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn is a somewhat unusual release from the likes of Mercury Studios, formerly known as Eagle Rock Entertainment, and a label probably better known for its glut of rock concert videos, especially a formidable run of Rolling Stones material. But what a welcome "change" this is. This is an incredibly ingratiating and ultimately rather meaningful piece which combines a descendant trying to get information on a famous relative with a host of musicological intrigue. Technical merits are solid, and Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn comes Recommended.