Puccini, by Fabio Campus, Nicola Lusuardi and Francesco Scardamaglia - Eight out of 10

Puccini, by Fabio Campus, Nicola Lusuardi and Francesco Scardamaglia

Eight out of 10

This is a note on the Film about the life of Puccini, not the book…

The merit of this biographical motion picture is that it brings to the fore the figure of what would arguably be called a genius – this viewer is not completely edified for two reasons, first the fact that a much greater mind has said that we should be careful with the genius label and second and more important, the undersigned is not equipped to evaluate the quality of an opera, a genre for which he has only the inclination to hear famous arias and segments and neither the patience, not the musical ear to go through the long singing dialogues of sopranos, baritones and others.

Otherwise, this film seems to be lost in complete obscurity, it happened to air on a channel in our parts where the audience is measured in less than one percent and at a time when a fraction of that abysmal rating is attained…we could have gathered together in a room, presumably, the few of us watching this feature which has no echoes elsewhere, forget about our land and to add to that, the treatment of the opera composer’s life, personality and achievements are not really resplendent…indeed, if they were, this would have been nominated, awarded prizes and acclaim…

As it is, the interest in watching this is purely personal and you surely could miss this note, unless you already did, for apart from the almost complete irrelevance of the movie – after all, the few who want to know about Puccini would go to the respectable sources, archives, libraries and other material and not look for light, deep learning and relevant details from such an obscure source.

The reason why I watched is because…I have a splendid macaw named Puccini and to admit to the already plain ignorance and disinterest in divine music, with the exceptions mentioned, it was just that the name sounded so amusing and appropriate – for all the wrong reasons – that I assigned it to my favorite baby, who was also supposed to engage in glorious, sublime arias – on the contrary, he speaks some interesting words, like oui, papa, hello and most laudatory Hannah, my daughter – and we had already had another macaw called Balzac so there you have it, Puccini could not have a less resounding name…

Part of the problem, perhaps the main one, is that the actor in the leading role does not have the granted immense charm, exceptional appeal needed to carry a feature that is concerned with the composer who has an overwhelming importance for the narrative, for which someone like Toni Servillo aka Gambardella in the astonishing La Grande Bellezza would have been so much more suited http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/08/note-on-la-grande-bellezza-aka-great.html

Well, there it is…as the Emperor kept saying in the spectacular, phenomenal Amadeus of milos Forman