Review of The Music Lovers (1971) by Jake C — 24 Oct 2018
Ostensibly like Tchaikovsky's own (and especially later) music, the film vacillates wildly in tone, shifting from scenes of intense and serious passion to moments ebullient and blithe-unlike Tchaikovsky, however, Russell's film fails to strike a balance among the extremes and ends up being rather pathetic in the end.
The topsy-turvy tonality fails to achieve the melodramatic import of lived experience that Tchaikovsky's work aspires to, instead coming across as ironic, inauthentic kitsch-the furthest thing from the romanticism at the heart of the music itself.
Tellingly enough, the best sequences-the drunken sex scene in the train, in particular, which is absolutely fabulous-are those that embrace Russell's characteristic ironic bathos, exposing the vulgar absurdity at the hidden core of 19th Century sensibilities, rather than the more generic temptation here to see in Tchaikovsky an analogue for queer experience today.
This review of The Music Lovers (1971) was written by Jake C on 24 Oct 2018.
The Music Lovers has generally received positive reviews.
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