Carmina burana

This was a colourful and lusty movie,set to Carl Orff's music. Costumes and settings spectacular which I have never seen the like of since. Regret not copying it on video at the time - have tried various places to purchase it over the years- even West Germany - without success.

I'd heard much about this film, but wasn't sure how anyone could possibly stage what is essentially an a-capella chorus. Me, I had my own ideas of how and what I wanted to shoot, but alas I wasn't sure how it could be done, nor think that any film maker would take on the challenge.

Like a lot of young males my age I first heard Orff's music in Boorman's "Excalibur". The music itself (and if you can't understand Latin) is very pretentious with a sense of urgency, and is also operatic in scope (no obvious self referential pun intended). Orff infuses a great deal of joy and magnificence in his composition and arrangements, to a level that I think most others would envy. I know I do. However Boorman, being a film maker and interested only in the image of thing to convey a message, chose the wrong music for his movie. "Excalibur" tells of Arthurian legends, where battles take place, strife, struggle, honor and deep angst, where Orff's piece is supposed to be a celebration of life, as the Latin tells. Did Boorman really mean some other message with Orff's music when he put it in during the battle sequences? Ehh... maybe, but I doubt it. To Boorman it was just really cool sounding music, so he dumped it in his film.

But, to the film: Sex. There's a lot of sexual references in this thing. So much that one wonders if director Gerhard Schmidt-Gaden had anything else in mind (or on his mind for that matter during shooting) when he conceived this project. But, he's not the only one, for Orff himself wrote the piece as an ode and celebration of life. The message is to not take life too seriously, and to enjoy life for what it is. If that means finding the person of your fancy and bedding them, then so be it.

We don't see much sex, just a lot of sexual imagery and innuendo. There's the whole Christian thing going on here conflicting with people's natural instincts and desires. All the high minded spiritual stuff is there, but essentially gets shelved, for men and women need one another. The two meet, fancy one another, and the woman challenges her man to prove his worth. He rises to the occasion, and through the struggle they come to couple. "It's the way of things" (to borrow from Boorman).

I first saw Orff's music performed by the San Francisco Symphony and chorus. It was very moving if somewhat bland by the visuals. However the German film makers here have put together a tapestry of inner desires, and the joys of living and being with the one you LOVE. Not the one you're forced with, not the one your parents or guardians chose for you, but the one you chose, and the one who chose you. That is the true message of Orff's piece.

Visually and stylistically the film may be a bit much for some people, but then again it was created and designed for the artsy classical music crowd, me included. It's shot indoors, lots of lighting, some adequate lip-syncing, lots of sexual imagery, and a very energetic and enthusiastic cast who tell the tale of want, desire and need of not just man, but of all creatures as time goes on. Lots of props, costumes, even a few FX/process shots, all amount to a unique look to this film.

Criticisms? My only one is that I haven't had a chance to shoot my version... as yet ;-)

Flat, dull, shot on video, populated by lots of ugly men and women. This is a wonderful piece of music set to boring visuals. What was the point. If they had hired some real actors or dancers with any skill, it could have been something. But as it is, we have the local amateur theatre of some small town in Bavaria, and a director with very little imagination. Forget the other reviews. I watched this because I wanted to see something more than a concert performance. But this definitely not it. Forget the other reviews. One even calls it an 'a capella' piece! DUH! Does he even know what the term means. It refers to a chorus without orchestra. In Orff's piece it is the orchestra that makes the performance. Well, anyway, at least he used a decent recording of the work (conducted by Eugen Jochim, if I remember right), so it isn't a total waste of time. Next time the director needs to at least find some performers that are good to look at, if nothing else, or better yet hire a ballet troupe.

Carl Orff wanted to see some sort of staging of his musical score, Carmina Burana. I'd like to think he would have approved of this one. Jean-Pierre Ponnelle films Carmina among stage pieces that often take the viewer where no theater audience could go. The effect is a bit like entering a Bosch painting.

This is the same method Ponnelle used with a number of operas, but here he is more free to create a fantasy world of images; here he has only a series of poems; no plot structure to furnish. If a few of the effects look a bit primitive, others are magical. And sometimes the whiplash from comedy to horror was so swift that I found myself questioning the smugness that led me to question this or that image, and I quickly found myself immersed in the work again.

The DVD has English subtitles for the Latin. How wonderful finally to be able to follow the text all the way through! However, I urge you, watch WITHOUT TEXT the first time through. The musical performance is good enough that, if you like the work, you'll happily go back. Orff chose to set Latin because he wanted us to take the meaning from the music. Trust that the outrageous things occurring on stage grow from the text, and submit to the pull of sounds and images. Words will clog the process, and the images will surprise and delight best on that first encounter if you're not busy reading. I'm a fan of subtitled movies, but we process words differently from sound.

I bought the DVD of this for the movie, but any movie of Carmina would be of passing interest if not well sung and played. This one is excellent. I have long admired Lucia Popp's Queen of the Night for Klemperer, and she is as good here. The rest of the cast and the orchestra is also up to the competition.

Alas, to my knowledge the DVD has never been issued in the US. I got my copy from England and play it in the US on my laptop which knows nothing of region codes and is equally happy playing PAL as NTSC. With laptop connected to my sound system I had a front row seat. No extra software was required for this on my Mac. I've been trying to see this production for 30 years. It says a lot that I wasn't disappointed.

Carl Orff's Carmina Burana is a work that has been growing on me over the years. Not that I disliked it before, but there was a while when O Fortuna was played so much on the radio and on television I found myself not as receptive to it. However listening to the whole of Carmina Burana I now appreciate it, primarily due to this film and the recording with Ozawa conducting and Sherrill Milnes singing the baritone solo.

I admire Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, and have enjoyed his ideas and opera films. All his work has ranged from good to outstanding, with his 1982 Rigoletto being in my opinion his crowning achievement. This 1975 Carmina Burana is outstanding, one of Ponnelle's best and in terms of ideas and imagination perhaps his most interesting. The music is brilliant and sung brilliantly by a very characterful and compelling chorus, played with evocative richness by the orchestra and conducted with authority. I know some may not like the fact you don't see the orchestra and not much of the chorus other than the occasional jumping up and down, but I didn't mind this personally.

One shouldn't dismiss the soloists either, they are all fantastic. John Van Kesteren as the tenor was the one I knew least, but he has a very pleasing voice. Lucia Popp is my personal favourite, she was a great soprano who died much too young, and here you hear a sincerity and ethereal quality to her already wonderful voice. I know from his performances as Figaro in Ponnelle's films Der Barbier Von Sevilla and Le Nozze Di Figaro and as Einsenstein in Die Fledermaus, that Hermann Prey had a clear hearty voice and always entertaining to watch. Here he is a little more subdued, but the resonance and clarity is still there as well as the presence.

Ponnelle's films and set and costume designs were always interesting. Some may criticise them for being too old-fashioned or too simple, however I find them very elegant. In Carmina Burana other than the music, it was the visuals that made this Carmina Burana so good. The costumes and settings are incredibly authentic and give the work its lust and piety, in fact of all Ponnelle's films it is Carmina Burana that contains some of his most evocative and imaginative ideas. The camera work is also excellent, and enhances the drama rather than distracts from it. The sound gives justice to the orchestration's power and the picture quality while not the clearest of other productions I've seen is above average.

All in all, a wonderful Carmina Burana. 10/10 Bethany Cox