O Thou Transcendent: The Life of Ralph Vaughan Williams (2007)

2008 marks the 50th anniversary of Vaughan Williams' death and this timely DVD is the first ever full-length film biography of the great man, prooduced by the multi-award winning director, Tony Palmer.

Interesting take on RVW but far less than it should have, could have been in being the first film bio on such a great composer

A great fan of RVW's music, and excitedly looked forward to viewing this piece......sadly disappointed in the result.

Tony Palmer does an interesting take on RVW's creative motivation....namely that it was to express in his music the various sufferings and tragedies of his own life and of his times. That may be so, it may not be. After all it was RVW himself who responded (I paraphrase): "....a man wants to write a piece of music for the sake of the music itself" when critics and reviewers wanted to interpret first his 4th, then his 6th symphony as about WWII and the turmoils of that era. Undoubtedly every artist in any media is of his times and influenced by the pleasures and pains of his own experience, but that does not necessarily mean that he is writing programmatic music to literally depict those times or events.

As another reviewer here has said, for Tony Palmer to repeatedly show brutal, horrible and tragic images from recent times (now 50 years after RVW's death) as a means to illustrate his own interpretation of the great motivational force in RVW's output, was a mistake. That did ruin this film.

And on a technical note, the repeated footage of mostly only two orchestras playing chopped up and mixed up excerpts from the several symphonies got to be confusing (and I do know the music) and uninteresting visually. For example, there is only one second symphony, yet it was identified in three separate ways as if there were three separate symphonies in question.

Also this film would have greatly benefited from sub-titles, remaining visible always in my opinion, but at least with the option to turn them on. Many of the interviews were unintelligible due to poor diction or fast speaking or the age of the person being interviewed.

And finally, the RVW voiceover is not identified as to source. When and why was this recorded, if it was actually RVW telling his life story? If not, who?

In the end, if you are a fan of RVW, you will want to see and probably own this DVD for your own reference collection, but it certainly was more of a disappointment to this RVW devotee than it should have been.

September 11, 2008

Five Stars, if not for graphic Footage

This is really a well-made and important piece on one of my favorite composers. I was going to have my eight-year old son watch it with me. I'm glad I didn't. The film maker included very graphic and disturbing film images of dead and dying children to emphasize the horrors of war. I really believe this hurt the film. The horrors of war could have been depicted in a way that did not draw us too far away from the subject matter, which is a great composer and his music. At the end, it was the gruesome images of tragedy and destruction that stayed with me, not the man and his transcendent music. I'm not against powerful images and shaking things up when necessary, but the film maker, for all of his good work, crossed the line to the point where his creation left me angry and disturbed, not enlightened and inspired. A few substituted scenes could have made the point and still kept the focus on the composer and his work. I would have given it 5 stars otherwise. August 29, 2008

O Thou Transcendent

A fascinating look at the life of a great composer. Be warned that there are some disturbing war images in the video that may not be suitable for young children. July 10, 2008

Excellent analysis of life and work of Ralph Vaughan Williams

This is a fascinating insight into the life and work of this composer. I ordered it specifically as preparation for an essay I was preparing on the composer, and found it to be both interesting and useful. Highly recommended for anyone interested in 20th century composition in England. May 21, 2008

Vaughan Williams revisited

This is another excellent bio film from Tony Palmer. Today Vaughan Williams seems to be a forgotten composer in North America. This film rekindled my interest in him and I am currently returning to his music by listening to his symphonies and his Masque Job. Much of the symphonic music is played brilliantly by the National youth Orchestra of Great Britain, an orchestra which Vaughan Williams helped to start.I found the film very touching and I would recommend it to anyone interested in British music in the first half of the 20th century. April 29, 2008

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