Don Giovanni **** (1979, Ruggero Raimondi, John Macurdy, Edda Moser, Kiri Te Kanawa) – Classic Movie Review 6429

Director Joseph Losey brings Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s magnificent opera masterpiece to the screen as a marvellous 1979 film of fire and water, lit like a golden Canaletto but lapped by the rancid waters of Venice’s murkier canals.

It is filmed in a heavy rococo style, rich as an overripe peach, and performed by a brilliant cast of world-class opera stars. As the title’s saturnine seducer and wicked womanizer Don Giovanni, Ruggero Raimondi gives a charismatic performance shot through with menace and uncontrollable sexuality in equal parts.

Visually and musically ravishing, with cinematography by Gerry Fisher, sets by Alexander Trauner and costumes by Francis Savel, this bold, brave film is Losey at his richest and Mozart at his darkest. The Orchestra and Chorus of the Opéra de Paris are directed by Lorin Maazel.

Eric Adjani co-stars in the role of the valet in black, and also featured are John Macurdy (The Commendatore), Edda Moser (Donna Anna), Kiri Te Kanawa (Donna Elvira), Kenneth Riegel, José Van Dam, Teresa Berganza, Malcolm King and Janine Reiss.

Villa Capra, La Rotonda, in Vicenza.

The movie is filmed at Andrea Palladio’s Villa Capra ‘La Rotonda’, outside Vicenza, near Venice, for Don Giovanni’s house, and the theatre is Palladio’s magnificent Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza, the same one used in Ripley’s Game (2002).

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 6429

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The Teatro Olimpico.