Red Violin, The (1998) [Blu-ray]
Drama | Music | Mystery | Romance

Tagline: An instrument of passion. A shocking secret. An extraordinary journey.

Francois Girard's The Red Violin follows the imaginary history of a unique instrument as it passes over continents and through lives over the span of three centuries. The film was shot in five languages, in five countries, over a period of six months. Beginning in Canada in February 1997, the production moved on to Austria, Italy, England and China before returning to Montreal for post-production.

Storyline: In present day Montreal, a famous Nicolo Bussotti violin, known as "the red violin," is being auctioned off. During the auction, we flash back to the creation of the violin in 17th century Italy, and follow the violin as it makes its way through an 18th century Austrian monastery, a violinist in 19th century Oxford, China during the Cultural Revolution, and back to Montreal, where a collector tries to establish the identity and the secrets of "the red violin." Written by Sean Gallagher

Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Stephen Holden on June 11, 1999 -- A film score can artistically make or break a movie, especially one -- like The Red Violin -- that aspires to a loftier-than-average cultural tone.

Whenever the music swells in this extravagant time-traveling costume drama tracing the 300-year life of a priceless hand-crafted violin, The Red Violin begins to assume the intense emotional colors of John Corigliano's ravishing score.

As Joshua Bell's solo violin pirouettes above the churning orchestrations, played by the London Philharmonia Orchestra under Esa-Pekka Salonen, the actors' expressions begin to seem profound, and an atmosphere of romantic exaltation co-opts the blunt, flat-footed dialogue.

But then the music subsides, and the movie clatters back down to earth.

For "The Red Violin," directed by Francois Girard, who wrote the screenplay with Don McKellar, is something coarser than its music would have us believe. The story, which jumps around in time and place, belongs to the Thousand-and-One-Nights genre of fanciful yarn-spinning.

Each episode is a gaudy historical tableau illustrating a particular society's relationship to European classical music. Over the course of three centuries, the violin makes its way from 17th-century Italy (Cremona) to 18th-century Austria (Vienna) to a tribe of mountain-dwelling gypsies, to 19th-century England (Oxford) to Communist China (Shanghai) and finally to contemporary Canada (Montreal).

To give the story a final fillip of suspense, Charles Morritz (Samuel L. Jackson, badly miscast), a rude, unscrupulous New York-based violin restorer, plays a high-stakes cat-and-mouse game with the Montreal auction house that has hired him to restore the instrument. He has discovered that it is the legendary "red violin," made in 1681 by the fictional Nicolo Bussotti (Carlo Cecchi).

The yarn begins at an auction in present-day Montreal where we watch the sale of a Stradivarius violin for nearly $2 million. Next up on the block is the newly restored red violin, which arrived at the auction house in a shipment of goods from China. As the bidding gets under way, the movie flashes back to late 17th-century Italy where we see the instrument being "born" in the workshop of Bussotti, a bullying master craftsman. We also meet his extremely pregnant wife, Anna (Irene Grazioli), and Cesca (Anita Laurenzi), the eagle-eyed old servant who, on the eve of Anna's giving birth, insists on reading her employer's tarot cards.

The story is structured around Cesca's turning up of the cards one by one. Her enigmatic interpretation of each card predicts an episode not in the life of Anna or the son she hopes to bear but of the special, perfect violin Bussotti has made.

The movie revels in cliches. One of the violin's first owners, Kaspar Weiss (Christoph Koncz), is an angelic prodigy who cuddles it in bed like a teddy bear and faints dead away (literally) during an audition.

The movie's giddiest set piece observes the silly romantic posturings of England's greatest violinist, Frederick Pope (Jason Flemyng), who suggests a flouncing hybrid of Liszt, Paganini and Byron, and his George Sand-like lover, Victoria (Greta Scacchi). One scene, in which Victoria awkwardly slavers over Frederick's half-clothed body while he plays, is unintentionally farcical.

Scenes set in Shanghai during Mao Tse-tung's Cultural Revolution, in which Western cultural artifacts are tossed into a bonfire, also come off as cartoonish distillations of history. And when the movie isn't dishing out this sort of instant history, it spends too much energy bending the narrative to create teasing little plot twists that aren't worth the effort.

The Red Violin wants to make a grand statement about the mystical power (both celestial and demonic) of great music. But give or take some scattered musical moments, the frame in which that message is couched is too kitschy to let that vision catch fire.

Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Stephen Holden on June 11, 1999 -- A film score can artistically make or break a movie, especially one -- like The Red Violin -- that aspires to a loftier-than-average cultural tone.

Whenever the music swells in this extravagant time-traveling costume drama tracing the 300-year life of a priceless hand-crafted violin, The Red Violin begins to assume the intense emotional colors of John Corigliano's ravishing score.

As Joshua Bell's solo violin pirouettes above the churning orchestrations, played by the London Philharmonia Orchestra under Esa-Pekka Salonen, the actors' expressions begin to seem profound, and an atmosphere of romantic exaltation co-opts the blunt, flat-footed dialogue.

But then the music subsides, and the movie clatters back down to earth.

For "The Red Violin," directed by Francois Girard, who wrote the screenplay with Don McKellar, is something coarser than its music would have us believe. The story, which jumps around in time and place, belongs to the Thousand-and-One-Nights genre of fanciful yarn-spinning.

Each episode is a gaudy historical tableau illustrating a particular society's relationship to European classical music. Over the course of three centuries, the violin makes its way from 17th-century Italy (Cremona) to 18th-century Austria (Vienna) to a tribe of mountain-dwelling gypsies, to 19th-century England (Oxford) to Communist China (Shanghai) and finally to contemporary Canada (Montreal).

To give the story a final fillip of suspense, Charles Morritz (Samuel L. Jackson, badly miscast), a rude, unscrupulous New York-based violin restorer, plays a high-stakes cat-and-mouse game with the Montreal auction house that has hired him to restore the instrument. He has discovered that it is the legendary "red violin," made in 1681 by the fictional Nicolo Bussotti (Carlo Cecchi).

The yarn begins at an auction in present-day Montreal where we watch the sale of a Stradivarius violin for nearly $2 million. Next up on the block is the newly restored red violin, which arrived at the auction house in a shipment of goods from China. As the bidding gets under way, the movie flashes back to late 17th-century Italy where we see the instrument being "born" in the workshop of Bussotti, a bullying master craftsman. We also meet his extremely pregnant wife, Anna (Irene Grazioli), and Cesca (Anita Laurenzi), the eagle-eyed old servant who, on the eve of Anna's giving birth, insists on reading her employer's tarot cards.

The story is structured around Cesca's turning up of the cards one by one. Her enigmatic interpretation of each card predicts an episode not in the life of Anna or the son she hopes to bear but of the special, perfect violin Bussotti has made.

The movie revels in cliches. One of the violin's first owners, Kaspar Weiss (Christoph Koncz), is an angelic prodigy who cuddles it in bed like a teddy bear and faints dead away (literally) during an audition.

The movie's giddiest set piece observes the silly romantic posturings of England's greatest violinist, Frederick Pope (Jason Flemyng), who suggests a flouncing hybrid of Liszt, Paganini and Byron, and his George Sand-like lover, Victoria (Greta Scacchi). One scene, in which Victoria awkwardly slavers over Frederick's half-clothed body while he plays, is unintentionally farcical.

Scenes set in Shanghai during Mao Tse-tung's Cultural Revolution, in which Western cultural artifacts are tossed into a bonfire, also come off as cartoonish distillations of history. And when the movie isn't dishing out this sort of instant history, it spends too much energy bending the narrative to create teasing little plot twists that aren't worth the effort.

The Red Violin wants to make a grand statement about the mystical power (both celestial and demonic) of great music. But give or take some scattered musical moments, the frame in which that message is couched is too kitschy to let that vision catch fire.

[CSW] -3.8- After watching too many would-be "great pieces" lately that are enticing you from TV commercials, leaving you (or me, I should say) disappointed most of the time, "The Red Violin" is a gem among all these fleeting flicks or time-wasters. From the story, costumes, cinematography, acting and finally its greatest actor -the superb music- all absolutely flawless! S.L.Jackson acts at his best, his performance is unforgettable and I am sure one of his own most favourite; I can tell. I was estatic to see J.Corigliano win the Oscar for the best score, and saddened at the fact that the whole movie wasn't nominated for even more Oscars - are they blind in that Academy or what?! Now that's a shame but you know what I don't care what the Academy has to say, important is my subjective feeling and this movie made my day, and days to come.
[V4.5-A4.5] MPEG-4 AVC - No D-Box


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