Don Giovanni (1979)

Sorry, this movie sucks

Simply Perfect

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

An inspired, if occasionally peculiar production, shot on location with a terrific cast. Raimondi's Don is an extraordinary conflagration of deceit and sexual magnetism, tourettish violence and charm; I watch the film assuming he's going to get away with everything (I once worked with a girl who had learnt the entire libretto in Italin from repeated viewings of this film alone at the age of 8, despite not speaking the language. She was reasonably addicted to the anti-hero).Losey undermines expectations though setting the opera in a (period) rural estate with the principals operating with urbane sensibility. Nothing is quite what it seems and the supernatural forces that begin to take hold are far from unexpected.Far from killing the operatic experience (as films are prone to do), Losey's film manages to set the drama free. Absorbing if not as menacing as its potential. 6/10

A fascinating film that seems to be operating on several levels at once. It was hard for me sometimes to just listen to it as an opera, because I felt that there were so many messages being imparted through the sets, landscape and especially the extras who continually move about the scene as the main characters sing and act their stories. Others have observed that the common people are present everywhere, and yet just ignored by Don Giovanni; he even conducts his attempted seduction of Zerlina with half a village standing on the steps and watching. As an aristocrat, he doesn't even acknowledge the existence of these underlings, and can do what he wants without worrying about their opinion or their interference. Nor is this just the behavior of a bad man; Don Ottavio is much the same during one of his arias (I think it is 'Il mio tesoro') when he is walking about declaiming as peasants dot the lawn, taking their afternoon siesta. Perhaps the point is not so much to accuse anyone of being deliberately cruel, as to underline how absolutely divided the aristocracy is from the common people. Not only do the aristocrats ignore the commoners, the commoners seem to be pretty oblivious to the aristocrats, too. No matter what Don Giovanni gets up to, the work of the peasants just goes on - he may wander down to the kitchen once in a while to give a little speech and pinch a serving wench, but it makes very little difference to anyone if he's present or not. The whole of this society seems as artificial and fragile as Don Giovanni's lace sleeves; this is a world that is almost at the limit of its ability to hold together under the weight of its contradictions.Ruggero Raimondi is a terrific Don Giovanni - handsome, graceful and charming, but with a hardness in the line of his mouth and his eyes that creates a very disturbing feeling of danger. Zerlina, though attracted, seems to sense that there is something wrong about him, though she isn't quite sure where to attribute the feeling of fear he inspires in her. Teresa Berganza was my favorite of the 3 main ladies; Edda Moser seemed very grim after her opening scene, and Kiri Te Kanawa reminded me irresistibly of Madeleine Kahn in "Young Frankenstein", especially with that tall silver-powdered hairdo. The silent servant played by Eric Adjani was another one of the puzzles that I felt this movie kept posing me. He seems to be a younger version of Don Giovanni, and one who is present almost as Don Giovanni's spirit, when the actual man is not there. During moments of crisis, he almost always watches Don Giovanni, not the action that is taking place outside him, and only Don Giovanni seems to really look at him. In the finale, he is almost like Banquo's ghost, sitting in Don Giovanni's chair until the master confronts him, and when the Commendatore's statue appears, Don Giovanni almost seems to bid him goodbye as he passes. I think the servant is Don Giovanni's conscience, the age when Don Giovanni, as a young man, cast him off and turned to evil. Now he follows him like a ghost of himself, observing but unable to influence.

This is a wonderful film, the only non-stage performance I've ever seen of this incredible opera. I saw it a million years ago in college and have probably watched it a dozen times over the years. Raimondi is demonically compelling as the Don, wicked, handsome, sardonic, and Van Dam plays off him as Leporello just wonderfully, balancing humor and pathos. Riegel's Ottavio is just as he should be, a humorless square, and Te Kanawa soars as Elvira. My only casting complaint is with Moser as Anna; she sounds very shrill. I liked the hint that perhaps Anna was, despite appearances, actually quite attracted to the Don as well; her protestations to the lumpish Ottavio that she thought it was actually he who'd come to her bedroom didn't persuade (and frankly, I've always wondered why he was such a putz as to buy it). The settings are lush and lovely, including Palladio's Villa Rotonda. Of course some of the lip-syncing is off a bit, but that's to be expected. I also eagerly await a day when this film is available on DVD.

This is such an outstanding display of cinematic and operatic talent that it should be seen by anyone with any interest in either. It introduced me to opera when it came out so I am eternally grateful.I'm waiting for the DVD and check here regularly for news. I thought that it had finally arrived in Germany, judging from the display on the iMdb page. Alas, that seems to be a different animal altogether, so we're still waiting. I'll try to get them to fix the link.Who does one lobby to get a DVD released?