The Death of Klinghoffer: Chorus of Exiled Palestinians

[thamestango]

It might have had a greater impact with just the images and the music.. the contrast in the horrific images and the serenely lyrical music could have been very powerful.

[geobabe73]

@dbryandolman: With that said, I think it's a crime that the only way I can hear this music is from excerpts from the movie. This is wonderful music and the fact that it convers a controversial subject should not deter opera companies or symphonies from performing it.

[geobabe73]

You're right in that the original opera (and to some extent, what I saw at Opera Theater) is somewhat abstract and that does not translate well into a movie. Ms Woolcock chose the story of the events that took place on the Achille Lauro over the music. For a movie-maker that's probably a wise choice.  What I saw was a somewhat scaled down version of the original opera, some scenes removed, a smaller orchestra, etc.

[geobabe73]

This and the Chorus of the Exiled Jews are wonderful bits of music and they are absolutely TRASHED by this (tone-deaf) movie director.  Opera Theater of St. Louis performed this opera recently and the choral parts were astounding. But you won't get the full impact from this video.

[dbryandolman]

@geobabe73 I'll speak up in defense of Penny Woolcock -- she draws some wonderful, very human performances out of her cast in the movie. The documentary style doesn't work for the choruses, it's true. But this was an opera written to be performed in a very abstract style (singers doubled by dancers on a cube of steel girders!) which obviously had to be discarded when they set about making a movie.

[dbryandolman]

@geobabe73 It's true that the wonderful choruses are the moments that ring most false, but I think that given the task of finding a naturalistic way of presenting something that had been very anti-naturalistic in concept, Woolcock did, on the whole, a pretty great job -- particularly in choosing and coaching her cast.

[golddjlr]

Did this really happen?? Most Palestinians fled because they were told to. In fact, Haifa and several other municipalities asked the Arabs to stay. I do not doubt that some Arabs were forced from their homes, but many just fled without seeing a single soldier. And how does this history excuse the murder of an old man in a wheelchair?

[lornamoone]

let us not forget the amazing Alice Goodman, who wrote the libretto!

[Nomadar]

This movie may be wholly inappropriate and mediocre, but this music is just deliciously beautiful. I never thought I'd be singing "and break his teeth" over and over through my head all day but this opera managed to make me do just that. Cheers to you, John Adams.

[randomcanadiandude]

This music is so beautiful. In this Opera both sides of the story are told, both beautifully and without bias. Adams is a genius!

[stickyfixer]

This opera was written as a fairly abstract theatre piece. To accompany the music with such specific footage is crass and does this extraordinary score a great injustice, and actually detracts from the enormity of the emotion expressed within the music. The director of this film also directed Dr Atomic recently for the ENO. She buggered that up n'all.

[JeeRant]

I agree. Woolcock's 'documentary-style' filmmaking goes against the very meditative nature of Adams' piece. I didn't like her production of 'Dr. Atomic', either.

[noelephantitis]

I agree as well. I had the displeasure of seeing the premiere of this film with the cast in attendance and it was painful and embarrassing. The nadir was actually showing Klinghoffer in his tourist outfit (Hawaiian shirt and all) sinking down into the sea, bug-eyed and white-faced, for his big aria. It was risible and deeply stupid. Woolcock is a totally misguided hack.

That said the original production was awful too in totally different ways.

This opera is unstageable!

[jjakajoep]

Criminals and murderers should be locked up. So should terrorists. I'm not denying that.

But to denounce a work which explores WHY people turn to terrorism is an act of worrying willingness for ignorance.

Reduction of terrorism can be achieved, but not through callous offense; that will only give extreme groups in such countries an excuse to rise to power, furthering the cause of terrorist groups.

[chris2002Rocklin]

"Reduction of terrorism can be achieved"

How?

Only truth can fight terror. The problem is that atheists won't allow the truth to be revealed that the Judeo Christian texts are infinitely more plausible that Islamic texts, that are clearly written to attack Jews & Christians till they are supreme.

It is literally a call to war.

Many moderate people choose not to, but this still doesn't change the facts about what it says.

Until the public gives broad support for exposing the truth...

[Orfeo68]

@jjakajoep FUCK U idiot

[ScriabinFanatic]

You miss the point then.

Why do you think terrorists want to attack us?

What if some group of people come to your town and round up all the people and burn their houses, etc. I think many would be very angry and want vengeance.

We are reaping the blowback we have sown from carelessly messing with their politics with goals to secure natural resources, etc. The sooner our government realize this the sooner we can begin to return to better relations with the mid-east.

[inlandempires]

Great music, but the opera and the film are just a cheap propaganda for terrorism. This is not art, unless you convieve Leni Riefenstahl work as "art".

[jjakajoep]

Leni Riefenstahl was given a job and motivation to force-feed lies to the German nation under the Nazi Party.

John Adams actually presents a balanaced account of the situation from both perspectives. Just because something doesn't come directly from your point of view doesn't make it terrorist propaganda. This 'us or them' mentality that some people seem to have is one of the reasons that terrorists attack Western countries in the first place.

[inlandempires]

Of course nothing can be "totaly balanced" in morality issues. BUT-there's a difference between understanding the motivation and accepting the actions.

When people who kill innocent people are being praised as holy figures, when the "historical review" of the conflic ignores the terrorist activities that were performed even before 1948, something stinks.

I don't think that in the 1930's "The West" should have tried to understand the motivation of the Germans. Sometimes it IS "us and them".

[ScriabinFanatic]

When you dehumanize your enemy makes it all the much easier to brutalize them. Terrorists are in fact human beings

[inlandempires]

Of course terorrorists are human beings, just like any other criminals and murderers. And like them, they should be put in an isolated place where they cannot harm society.

[Longfellow10]

John Adams is a national treasure. An intellectual giant and just plain damn good.

[JeeRant]

Amen!!

[soundsfromnothing]

I've never actually seen this, but-from what I've heard-when Mrs. Klinghoffer spit on the Palestinian, he didn't think it was funny. He was the person that she was in contact with. He seemed(to her)to be the more reasonable than the rest. She spit on him because he lied to her(& said her husband was okay, after he was murdered). From what I've heard(& from what the tv movie projected)he did have some remorse for what occured. He was still a piece of garbage, but apparently better than the rest.

[CobaltJewel]

This is the very beginning of the opera, bringing us into major conflict. Mrs. Klinghoffer's aria "You embraced them", caps the opera off. This is one of the best pieces of music ever written, hands down.

[HinZ3]

It's a definite shame that this chorus in particular isn't performed more or even cancelled at some concerts since the attacks on the World Trade Centre in 2001. Orchestra's should have more courage and not so much 'prudence'. You can't censor culture, not this piece anyway.

[iiiset]

@HinZ3 I agree and would only mention that Mr. Adams does not take sides. He is too smart for that.

[CharlesGrodin]

I love this stuff, but I do not know how the exerts of the film fir together, so i fear that I am watching the beginning before the end.

Please can the exerts be numbered so that I can catch the full feel of the film.

[Nullifidian]

The opera starts off with the Chorus of the Exiled Palestinians, then immediately segues into the Chorus of the Exiled Jews. Mrs. Klinghoffer's First and Second Songs, are, of course, in the order stated by their numbering.

You really should treat yourself to the CD set, if you can find it, because it has many more choruses than are found on the DVD. My particular favourite, the Desert Chorus, didn't make the cut.

[barmanjoe]

And also I'm not sure that the opera would make much sense, as the characters are singing things from the real world, and the choruses are mostly symbolically biblical, making you wonder what on earth they mean. But if you go into them deeply, there is a higher spiritual meaning in them, it all gets clear....it took me a while though.

[zeligniano]

The first part of the film and the opera, the song of the exiled palestinians and jews, its a really contemporanean peace of art