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Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

I had the absolute joy of seeing this version of "Manon Lescaut" on the stage at the Metropolitan Opera as it was actually being taped...which makes it all the more wonderful, because I can watch it on the screen, and remember being there as it happened.Renata Scotto was easily one of the best singing actresses ever to grace the stage of the Met, and in this performance she absolutely outdid herself, singing as wonderfully as she acted, and looking adorable besides. Plus, she had the extra added benefit of appearing opposite Placido Domingo...a stunning Des Grieux, young and virile and incredibly handsome, with a voice of cream and gold.The Met production was a wonder, only a bit of which translates well onto the videotape; this was still in the relatively primitive days of recording live performances. But for sheer dramatic thrill, and pure sonic sex, this "Manon Lescaut" cannot be beat. The high point for me? Des Grieux's 3rd Act aria, "No, pazzo son! Guardate!" What the viewer cannot see on the video, unfortunately, because there was no way of doing a real close-up of the singer's face, were the tears that were actually streaming down Domingo's face as he pleaded with the captain to allow him to accompany Manon to her exile in America. I was sitting first row, dead center, right behind James Levine's waving arms, and with my opera glasses trained on Domingo's face, I can tell you that he was crying -- really crying. At the end of that act, the entire standing room only audience was cheering, laughing and crying right along with him...Bravissimo, Domingo!!

I don't know which Manon Lescaut I prefer over this Met production and the 1983 Covent Garden one because they are both so wonderful to watch. Manon Lescaut is not my favourite Puccini opera, I much prefer Tosca and La Boheme for characters and story, but the duet and Intermezzo especially are two of the most beautiful pieces of music Puccini ever wrote and Act 4 is just heart-breaking.This production is exquisite, beautifully produced costumes, sets and staging wise and the photography and sound are equally great. The orchestra's playing is suitably sensitive and full of feeling while James Levine's conducting is outstanding.The singing and acting is really very well done. Both Renata Scotto and a suitably youthful Placido Domingo are in splendid voice and both demonstrate how wonderful their acting is with aplomb. Their chemistry is a major reason alongside the music why the last act touches me as much as it does, Scotto's Sola Perduta Abbandonata especially is absolutely devastating. The rest of the cast do very well, in particular Pablo Elvira but it is the two leads who positively dominate.All in all, exquisite helped by the wonderful music and the two leads. 10/10 Bethany Cox

This 1980 film from the Met stars Renata Scotto, in splendid voice, in one of the few roles that she committed to film. Her performance is matched by that of the youthful Plácido Domingo, as Des Grieux. Other than that, I am afraid that there is not much to recommend it. Domingo filmed this opera again, three years later, opposite Kiri Te Kanawa but preferable to both those versions is the 1997 recording from La Scala. starring Maria Guleghina and José Cura, both in fine voice.The 1997 film is in pin-sharp widescreen whereas this 1980 version is in fuzzy square vision. Also, the singers' voices sound distant, as though the recording was made with just a couple of microphones slung across the auditorium. To be fair, that's what live opera really sounds like but listeners to opera on film are used to the singers' voices being much more forward.As I said in my review of Massenet's opera Manon, I only got as far as page 18 in the Abbé Prévost's novel Manon Lescaut because I made the mistake of trying to read it in French and I got bogged down in the imperfect subjunctives. I don't know how the story ends but Massenet's version has always struck me as more plausible. Puccini's music is beautiful and the first two acts are fine but the final two acts, with Manon being deported and dying of a fever in the American desert, are just plain silly. OK, OK, who expects opera to be plausible?