| Gounod - Faust / Kraus, Ghiuselev, Gonzalez, Guingal, Teatro Regio di Parma | 
| Actors: Gounod, Alfredo Kraus, Nicola Ghiuselev, Ana Maria Gonzalez, Alain Guingal
Studio: Hardy Classics DVD
Category: DVD
List Price: $39.95
Buy New: $27.77
You Save: $12.18 (30%)
Buy New/Used from $27.69
Avg. Customer Rating:   (8 reviews)
Sales Rank: 65621
Format: Classical, Color, Dvd-video, Ntsc
Language: French (Dubbed)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Media: DVD
Running Time: 190 minutes
Number Of Items: 1
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
EAN: 8018783040054
ASIN: B0000665WO
Release Date: July 23, 2002
Theatrical Release Date: 1986
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
 This is a bad transfer from an old VHS tape. June 26, 2007
I fully agree with an another reviewer (Dr. Elizer) in that this DVD is a bad transfer from an old VHS tape. You can actually see some noise lines at the bottom constantly throught the whole opear. Of course the video and audio quality is very bad. I cannot understand the people who are giving more than one stars for this product either. The performance itself is not actually bad. But it is not good enough to justify the suffering from bad quality video and audio. I rented it from local library. I watched it skipping a lot, and immediately returned it. Buy some good CD for this opera (or LPs - which I have a couple of performances). It's much more enjoyable.
Sounds Fine, Looks awful January 23, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I just received the DVD of this 1986 performance. It is a DVD version of a VHS tape, and suffers from the transfer. The scenes are almost uniformly too dark--in many cases, nothing is visible. The live performance from Parma convinces me that I will never want to see another. Casting of the principals was good, especially Mephistofeles, but was done--as usual-- for the voices rather than personality. The choristers, while singing adequately, should never have been shown in close-up, as most were geriatric, and their movement was VERY badly blocked and mechanical. The same can be said for the ballet.
All that being said, operas are for the music, not the staging; Ghiuselev, as Mephistofeles, was magnificent. Unfortunately, the sound quality is a bit fuzzy, probably due to the age and transfer.
 A fine dvd. October 11, 2006
6 out of 7 found this review helpful
A fine dvd of a provincial Italian (Parma) opera company which never the less gives a good performance. Recorded live in 1986. Picture quality: slightly fuzzy, ***1/2. Sound quality, good, not great, ***1/2.
Cast: good. Mephistopheles: excellent. Marguerite: excellent. Alfredo Kraus as Faust: FANTASTIC! His big aria stops the show. What a great artist he was.
two versions May 10, 2006
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
There are two different versions of this Faust available on the net. Both star Kraus, Ghiuselev,and Gonzales as the leads and Guingal as the conductor. Unfortunatly, I purchased a VHS copy of the poorer version, produced by the Bel Canto Society in 1986.
Both video and sound quality are extremely poor on this version, although the leads sing quite well.
The Faust drama itself is very intriguing (What do you want most in the world, and what would happen to you if you got it?)
This music drama is well worth purchasing in the better version. But beware of used copies being sold elsewhere.
THERE'S A MISTAKE - THIS IS A 1986 PERFORMANCE FROM PARMA November 17, 2005
28 out of 29 found this review helpful
I have no idea what the other reviewers on this page are talking about ----- nor do I even know the performance to which they are alluding. It is certainly not this one. I purchased a VHS of the 1986 Parma "Faust" with Alfredo Kraus and the cast noted above. It most emphatically cannot be the one to which my fellow reviewers are referring. To begin with, I found the picture, even on VHS, to be vastly superior to many other live performances. State of the art it's not, but it's perfectly watchable, and, at times, pretty darn good. Moreover, I found the sound to be good enough to dub onto C.D. directly from the VHS. Since Alfredo Kraus never recorded Faust commercially, I wanted this performance in a CD format as well as a VHS one. With that established, I would like to say that tenor Kraus, soprano Gonzales, and bass Guiselev are all excellent. The entire ballet sequences are included here, and, as I have already said, I can't understand that which the other reviewers are referring. Is it possible that Amazon accidently posted these reviews to the wrong performance? They give the year as 1957, which is obviously incorrect. Alfredo Kraus didn't incorporate the role of Faust into his repertoire until much, much, later (probably the mid 1970's). I found this performance visually satisfactory and musically excellent. My only reservation is that there is some minor peaking in some of the louder passages ------- but no distortion. Again I reiterate -------- this cannot be the same performance eluded to in the previous postings. I believe that these reviews were posted incorrectly.
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