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| Bellini - Norma / Patane, Caballe, Vickers, Veasey, Theatre Antique d'Orange |  | Director: Pierre Jourdan
Actors: Montserrat Caballé, Jon Vickers, Joséphine Veasey, Agostino Ferrin, Marisa Zotti
Studio: Video Artists Int'l
Category: DVD
List Price: $39.95
Buy New: $26.22
as of 3/16/2010 19:33 CDT details
You Save: $13.73 (34%)
New (18) Used (3) from $26.22
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Seller: overman2000
Rating:  30 reviews
Sales Rank: 16,779
Format: Classical, Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
Languages: Italian (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Subtitled)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Region: 0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 160 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: 4229
UPC: 089948422990
EAN: 0089948422990
ASIN: B000083C73
Theatrical Release Date: 1974
Release Date: March 11, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 30
 Sound quality ruins experience. March 1, 2010
Keara Clemons (Hermon, Maine)
This is probably my family's favorite opera. We own the recording by Caballé and Domingo, and have listened to it many times. No one sings this role with more warmth and beauty than Caballé. We were excited to watch this opera, and we were able to borrow a copy through our inter-library loan system. It's true - Caballé is in top form here. She acts wonderfully and sings beautifully. But the acoustics of the theater made the other lead singers sound tinny and shrill. Vickers looked unconvincing and grouchy, and even missed one of the high notes. The worst part was the wind noise. It got so terrible that finally, we couldn't finish watching it. What an unfortunate thing to have made the one film of Caballé singing this beautiful opera, at an outdoor amphitheater! A terrible shame. I hope some new talent will come along and make a film of this opera with modern sound equipment - and not film it outdoors!
 1974 vs. 1978 January 15, 2010
Claudia N. Davidsen (Ruskin, FL)
I love this 1974 Norma, for the same reasons the other reviewers do. Just a comparison note: In 1974's Guerra, Guerra, Caballe's still relatively gentle Norma "plays" the gong with a percussionist's stroke. Bel Canto has a 1978 performance on VHS in which Caballe gives us a furious Norma, a Norma who truly knows she has run out of options. Guerra, Guerra sees Norma beat the Hell out of that gong, from side to side, using about 1,000 pounds of strength per square inch. Then she beats it some more. She finishes by slinging the mallet down as hard as she could. Two different interpretations, and I love them both.
it's so good April 18, 2009
Greg the guy (Spokane, WA USA)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I don't know if Caballe's was the best Casta Diva ever; I only have four Normas, and I know how people argue about these things, and I really don't care whose trills don't quite work or whose energy flagged toward the end. I absolutely love this recording. More for its drama than for anything else, and for me drama is the real heart of opera. The conducting: the tone set in the overture, attacked with a ferocity you usually only get when lives are actually at stake. The costumes, which make Vickers look like a real Roman general (see the tenor's costume in Sutherland's DVD of the same opera, for an unhappy counterexample) and the Druids (through some cosmically serendipitous prescience) look disturbingly like Palestinian Arabs. The setting, giving an opera set in Roman-occupied Gaul a stage built by the Romans when they occupied Gaul. The acting, as Vickers declares his love at the top of his lungs (he doesn't hit the high notes others do but damn! he knew how to be the hero) and makes it work, as Caballe convinces us all she IS the priestess who sees the end of the world. The titanic, magnificent central trios, as our three main characters blunder about the stage like blind giants or Greek gods, banging into one another and wondering why it hurts.
It is true that it's not nearly as satisfying to listen to this with the video off. Callas' studio version brings out the tenor's role in the trio much better, exposing a great deal of music that doesn't come through in this, and it's well known that the Sutherland/Horne duets were actually unachievable, and thus probably the only real evidence we have for the existence of God; but get this one too. Get this one too.
 a dignified norma April 6, 2009
Kevin M. Rigby
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
Most bel canto operas can get away with a soprano with limited acting skills. Unfortunately, Norma is the exception. Once Norma has decided to immolate herself, she enters an exalted state, she is "beside herself". Maria Callas tore through this like a raging tiger. Montserrat Caballe does it with regal dignity. I don't think it works. Kevin R.
Too Old to Carry Production Values July 27, 2008
Roger M. Olien (Austin, Texas)
3 out of 8 found this review helpful
The performances by Caballe and Vickers were excellent, but the visual quality of the video is inferior, blurred with mushy color. The original was too old to reproduce satisfactorily, I assume.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 30
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