Maria Callas - A Documentary plus Bonus (engl.) - Codaex Deutschland

The film succeeds in showing the fascination of the woman and the artist, the interaction of the one with the other, and, in doing so, to move its audience with the strange mixture of glorious public achievement and deep personal unfulfilment. Stranger still, perhaps, is the stirring of so many conflicting reactions. In the midst of such insistent testimony, the film footage of Callas "in action" inevitably tests the claims. Does it truly support them? Is that filmed "Vissi d'arte", for instance, really the work of a great operatic actress? Often it rather strenghens the view that with Callas, as with all great opera singers, most of the acting is done with the voice. And yet at the end we are left with her singing "Ah, non credea mirarti" from La sonnambula, where the voice becomes frail and unsteady while the face is transfigured, infinitely touching. No: it's a film not to be missed, and the bonus footage sheds interesting light on its making, especially from John Ardoin, clearly one of it's prime movers.