Isadora [Blu-ray]

I saw this 1968 film in the 1980s on a premium movie channel and was impressed but haven't seen it available anywhere since. This new release is compatible for US players unlike previous releases. KL Studios did a great job on this excellent film. Isadora Duncan was quite an interesting and eccentric character, whose life is told in flashbacks as she dictates her autobiography. Outstanding performances from Vanessa Redgrave and the rest of the cast, screenplay, cinematography, editing and music.

This is a wonderful film about the life of Isadora Duncan. It's well-acted and danced by Vanessa Redgrave, well directed, well photographed. I wish it were transferred to DVD with undertitles for my international students who are fascinated by her, her life, her art but need help with understanding the British accents. Undertitles would certainly help. The DVDs which do exist are only playable in Region 2 and, unless one purchases a special DVD player, these DVDs remain unaccessible.

A phenomenal and gripping bio-pic of the phenomenal Vanessa Redgrave playing the role (stunningly) of the shocking life of American dancer Isadora Duncan. My favorite scene... her lover, a stage set designer, painting his bedroom in moonlight so that the floor would always look like moonlight... as Isadora dances around him either naked or in something totally diaphanous... Another great scene... When she goes to open a school in Russia (her last husband was a well know Russian poet)... and dances in scalding red for the workers. Wow. Director: Ken Russell Redgrave even LOOKS like Isadora... google it! PLEASE see this amazing film... all of it wonderful. Some very heartbreaking incidents for Isadora... she lived on the edge and sometimes it bit her backsides... but SO WORTH SEEING.

The cinematography makes this film beautiful to look at and it's the best part of the movie. This is the worst performance by Vanessa Redgrave that I have ever seen. Her attempt at an American accent is terrible. Apparently, she thought the key to an American accent is speaking through your knows in a monotone. Her wooden performance is not helped by the stilted dialogue and rambling script. The film lacks focus and the characters lack depth. I wish I could say the dancing makes it worth watching but that's just one more disappointment in a thoroughly disappointing film.

Wonderful movie about a complex life. Tremendous recreations of Isadora Duncan's triumphs on the stage and her ultimately tragic personal life. Very moving. Redgrave is glorious.

After saying that 'Isadora', the film by Karel Reisz that stars Vanessa Redgrave is one of my great favourites, and I believe one of the very best bio-pics ever made, I am going to pass on to the second disc, a 'bonus' of the complete 107 minute 'Isadora' Ballet,, with choreography by Kenneth MacMillan, and music by Richard Rodney Bennett. Bennett was one of my most loved modern composers. A true eclectic, he was an adept at Serialism, traditional tonality, Jazz, and Pastiche, all of which are evident in the really solid, endlessly fascinating score, for symphony orchestra with extended piano solos, a narrator, and, briefly, a chorus.MacMillan set himself quite a task, reducing Isadora Duncan's busy life to a narrative ballet that lasts under two hours. The ballet has two Isadoras, one dancing, and one speaking. (Shades of the Brecht/Weill ballet 'The Seven Deadly Sins', where Anna is embodied by both a dancer and a singer.) Although both dancer and actress are superb, and look very much alike, this is ultimately too choppy and distracting. A straightforward dance narrative would have been more interesting.The supporting cast are all excellent. The male dancers representing Duncan's many lovers are wonderful, and well chosen for physical type. The Pas de Deux of Duncan and Paris Singer after Isadora's children are killed in an accident, is heartrending. The Covent Garden production couldn't be better.Well filmed, and a more than decent sound recording.Apologies for not including the names of the dancers and actress. They are only to be found on the DVD itself, and nowhere in the packaging.A fascinating and frustrating work.

Isadora Duncan lived her life on a whim just as she wanted. Being unique in her free-spirited manner of dance made her a sensation in the early 1900s. Spoiled by her lovers and supporters, sadly, she was not adept in handling her money, so had little most of the time. Her true loves, her children, met with an awful fate, causing her deepest hurt. Then she, herself, met her shocking fate. The true story of Duncan's semi-sweet life still inspires the reader to experience where passion truly draws her or him.

This is a good but very dated movie. Also the quality of this DVD is not of the best. It appears ans a blurred movie, although the sound is good and the plot is also very good, including her bizaar death.I did purchase this movie from Amazon.Com, which is my favorite source for all books and movies and countless other products but Amazon .Com has revolutionized the book and movie businesses, gone are the days of hunting down movies and books in dusty heaps in old used odds and end stores, now I find the hardest-to-locate boos and movies literally in minutes!