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Post by crabtree on Jan 1, 2020 19:40:09 GMT
Now that is the way to film dance, letting the audience see the dancing, not editing it into a million pieces - letting the dance speak but using cuts to emphasise the details. Gorgeous, heartstopping (the death of Tybalt!). I loved the way the direction let the audience in gently to the conventions of dance, so gently that you hardly noticed they were dancing, as it seemed the most natural thing, the most natural way to express the story. Simply loved this. Maybe they were unsure how to use sound - there was a lot of party 'rhubarb' going on but not the sound of bottles as they crashed to the floor. ne''er mind, watch the death of Tybalt and the torture of Juliet making up her mind as she sits on the bed. I always love that moment in the stage production - the orchestra is screaming away, and she sits statically on the bed, working out what to do. No gimmicks, just wonderful dancing and sophisticated storytelling and visuals. Everything a certain other film should have been - miaow.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 1, 2020 21:20:45 GMT
Oh. I really hated how it was filmed. Too many tables, curtains and bushes getting in the way of the dancing and the choreography. And I thought some of the costumes looked really out of place in the naturalistic setting. I would have much preferred to see a properly filmed version where you can see the dancing.
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Post by Dawnstar on Jan 1, 2020 22:36:37 GMT
I agree with you @elanor. I thought the performances were excellent & was pleased that many of the main characters were played by the dancers who I thought were the best in their roles out of the 5 casts I saw in the R&J run last season, including Hayward, Ball, Sambe, Mock & Hay. However a lot of the camerawork I found infuriating, especially most of the bedroom pdd being viewed through gauze drapes & most of the final scene being viewed through bars.
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Post by crabtree on Jan 1, 2020 22:58:57 GMT
I'll give you that all the foreground stuff was like a 60's 3D movie, but I loved the clarity and emotion. It certainly moved me, and I preferred the filming of the dance to the other dance film out at the moment.
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Post by cartoonman on Jan 2, 2020 9:20:32 GMT
First let me say I have only been to ballet a few times and have no expert knowledge. I agree with Elanor as well.
I was knocked out by R & J last night. It kept me stuck to screen for the whole performance. I've seen opera done in a similar way but never a ballet. I would love to see other ballets like this. Great music as well.
How about Spartacus?
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Post by Dawnstar on Jan 2, 2020 10:44:28 GMT
One of the recent interviews with the directors of this R&J said they would like to do other ballets in the same way. However given Spartacus isn't in the RB's rep I wouldn't think it's likely they'd do that one. Maybe the other two major MacMillans, Manon & Mayerling, might be more likely candidates? (If so then they need to have Hayward as Manon because she was amazing in the role in October.)
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Post by musicallady on Jan 2, 2020 20:39:47 GMT
I wish I’d saved it to my Sky box. I loved it. However for me, the perfect Romeo and Juliet was by NBT with William Walker and Jane Regan dancing the leads. I had it on VHS ( yes I’m that old), leant it to a friend who deliberately destroyed it after a fall out. You can’t get it on DVD.
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Post by Someone in a tree on Jan 3, 2020 7:52:07 GMT
I really enjoyed this.
I couldn't help thinking it looked a bit 70's though and I'm not sure why. The KM version first appeared in 1966 do the costumes date from then?
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Post by Deleted on Jan 3, 2020 15:18:19 GMT
I really enjoyed this. I couldn't help thinking it looked a bit 70's though and I'm not sure why. The KM version first appeared in 1966 do the costumes date from then? I think it was the colours. Many of the costumes were bright, and outdoors in sunshine they looked even more unnatural - all a bit technicolor, 60s/70s style. The last R&J I saw had much more muted, earthy colours, as far as I can remember, and I liked that better.
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Post by Someone in a tree on Jan 3, 2020 15:36:58 GMT
I really enjoyed this. I couldn't help thinking it looked a bit 70's though and I'm not sure why. The KM version first appeared in 1966 do the costumes date from then? I think it was the colours. Many of the costumes were bright, and outdoors in sunshine they looked even more unnatural - all a bit technicolor, 60s/70s style. The last R&J I saw had much more muted, earthy colfours, as far as I can remember, and I liked that better. Yes. This one did look very picture book perfect didn't it?
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Post by tmesis on Jan 6, 2020 19:20:55 GMT
This was enjoyable but it failed to move or excite me as a good live performance would at ROH. Far too often the camera was frustratingly on the upper part of a character's body when I wanted to see the footwork. I felt it just trivialised MacMillan's masterpiece making it all feel a bit 'Matthew Bourne' - and I don't mean that as a compliment. I'm probably not the right person to judge this having seen the RB version of this at ROH so many times over the past 40 plus years I've lost count and given Bourne great popularity this is possibly the film's target audience.
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