Swan Lake (UK)

8 / 10
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Contemporary dance company Adventures in Motion Pictures` triumphant modern re-interpretation
Certificate: none
Running Time: 117 mins
Retail Price: £19.99
Release Date:

Synopsis:
Contemporary dance company Adventures in Motion Pictures` triumphant modern re-interpretation of `Swan Lake`, with its cast of male swans, has turned tradition upside and taken the ballet fraternity by storm.

Never has such a contemporary re-working of a traditional ballet thrilled both ardent critics and modern dance enthusiasts in such equal measure.

Special Features:
Interactive Menus
Scene Access

Video Tracks:
Standard 1.33:1

Audio Tracks:
Dolby Digital 5.1 English
PCM Stereo

Directed By:
Matthew Bourne

Distributor:
BBC

Your Opinions and Comments

8 / 10
I`ve never seen Swan Lake on stage before.
I did, however, know the story and listen to the music when I was much younger. Come to think of it, most of us have.
Tchaikovsky`s masterpiece tells the story of a young prince who falls in love with a white swan. As simple as that.
The modern adaptation of the story is superb.
The dancers are all very convincing and practically dance as if there`s no gravity on stage. The costumes are very colorful and the choreography (and I`m NO expert) is really amazing.
The video transfer is very good. Most of the scenes contain dim lights and a lot of shadows, which are very well reproduced on the disk. There is, however, a tiny bug with the disk on several players (especially DVD-ROM drives). Notice that the top part of the screen constantly contains an ever-changing matrix of dots and lines (probably something went wrong with the digitization process). I tried 2 disks on 2 DVD players and could not get rid of this thing. It IS ignorable, but such a wonderful disk should be 100% flawless.
The DD 5.1 audio is outstanding. Of course the DD stereo is also good, but the 5.1 delivers the best results. You really get the feeling you are watching the play from the front row. The channels are very well balanced and while there`s hardly any dialogue in the play, the stage sounds DO come from the center speaker.
The extras include the contents of each act some background information about the dancers and the producer.
This is definately a MUST BUY disk. This kind of a disk puts a new meaning to the word re-watchable.
posted by Zvi Josef on 18/7/2000 02:15