Category Archives: Cinema, video & DVDs

Cathartic tears on November 11th

Posted on November 12, 2025 by barczablog

With every Remembrance Day, I wonder how best to respond to the implications of November 11th, a day when we are encouraged to honour those who gave their lives in wars, in service to the nation. I went to a … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Personal ruminations & essays | Tagged ankylosing spondylitis, Benjamin Britten, Derek Jarman, history, In Flanders Fields, iritis, John McRae, Laurence Olivier, poetry, Ray Charles, Remembrance Day, Reveille, Stuart Bull, The Last Post, Tilda Swinton, UTS, uveitis, War Requiem, Wilfred Owen | Leave a comment

Discovering Mandle Philharmonic via YouTube

Posted on July 3, 2025 by barczablog

I’ve been watching the passionate responses to the concert at Roy Thomson Hall last week when Mandle Cheung conducted the Toronto Symphony in Mahler’s 2nd Symphony. The Globe & Mail contacted me the day before, asking me if I’d be … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Music and musicology | Tagged classical-music, concert, Gilbert Kaplan, Gustav Mahler, Ludwig van Beethoven, Mandle Cheung, Mandle Philharmonic, Roy Thomson Hall, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Urlicht | Leave a comment

A Real Pain’s Chopin

Posted on June 24, 2025 by barczablog

I have just seen Jesse Eisenberg’s film A Real Pain (2024). I call it his, in the sense that Eisenberg wrote & directed and also stars as David opposite Kieran Culkin who is David’s cousin Benji. They are on a … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Music and musicology, Reviews | Tagged A Real Pain, Adrien Brody, Andrea Most, Erick Eiser, film music, Frederic Chopin, Hava Nagila, Holocaust, Irving Caesar, Jesse Eisenberg, Jewish culture, Kieran Culkin, Making Americans, marijuana, Poland, Tea for Two, The PIanist, Wladyslaw Szpilman | Leave a comment

Reflections from Stephen Bell, former COC chorister, Founder of Coffeeshop Film & Creative

Posted on June 16, 2025 by barczablog

Stephen Bell is an award winning filmmaker and visual designer based in Toronto. Videographer by day and opera singer by night, Stephen is the Founder of Coffeeshop Film & Creative. And on May 25th Stephen posted on Facebook that after … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Interviews, Opera | Tagged Angela Bell, Bardia Doust, Brahm Goldhamer, Canadian Opera Company, COC Chorus, Coffeeshop Film & Creative, digital content, Eric Moniz, Four Seasons Centre, La Maupin, Messiah/Complex, music, opera, OperaQ, passagio, Sandra Horst, Stephen Bell, Tenor, videographer, videography | Leave a comment

Faust Adaptations

Posted on November 4, 2024 by barczablog

Today I saw the closing performance of the Canadian Opera Company’s new production of Gounod’s Faust, in a week when it seemed everyone was selling their soul to the devil even without the manifest falsehoods of politicians at election time. … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Opera, Personal ruminations & essays | Tagged Ariane Cossette, Canadian Opera Company, Centre Stage, Cesare Siepi, Charles Gounod, F W Murnau, Faust, Franz Schubert, Gretchen am Spinnrade, Hector Berlioz, Jerome Hines, Jessica Harper, Johannes Debus, Kyle Ketelsen, La Damnation de Faust, Nabucco, Paul WIlliams, Phantom of the Paradise, Robert Lepage, Szymon Mechlinski, Walpurgisnacht Ballet | Leave a comment

Nick Hamm nixes Will Tell ham

Posted on September 13, 2024 by barczablog

My headline is not just a nod to “Sticks Nix Hick Pix”. There truly was no ham to see in the gala World Premiere of William Tell, unless we include the man who wrote and directed, namely Nick Hamm speaking … Continue reading →

Posted in Books & Literature, Cinema, video & DVDs, Reviews | Tagged Ben Kingsley, Claes Bang, Friedrich Schiller, Gioachino Rossini, Jonathan Pryce, Nick Hamm, Rosmersholm, Steven Price, The Sound of Music, William Tell | Leave a comment

Thinking about Richard Strauss’s death in 1949

Posted on August 29, 2024 by barczablog

On September 8, 1949 composer and conductor Richard Strauss died after a long productive life. I think of him as a romantic composer carrying on the stylistic traditions of Richard Wagner. In Salome and Elektra he was the modernist pushing … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Music and musicology, Opera, Personal ruminations & essays | Tagged Akhnaten, Ariadne auf Naxos, Bill Shookhoff, Claude Debussy, Franz Liszt, Hart House, Mathieu Marcil, Percy Grainger, Philip Glass, Richard Strauss, Richard Wagner, Salome, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Venus in Furs | Leave a comment

The lessons of James Morris’s Wotan for this Canadian

Posted on July 1, 2024 by barczablog

It’s Canada Day. I live in Toronto and am a subscriber to the Canadian Opera Company. I was remembering examples I’ve seen south of the border at the Metropolitan Opera. Yes they import talent, bringing in Italians to sing Verdi … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Opera | Tagged Canada Day, Canadian Opera Company, David Ferguson, James Morris, John Tomlinson, Perryn Leech, Wotan | 8 Comments

Mourning Donald Sutherland

Posted on June 22, 2024 by barczablog

I am another Canadian mourning the passing of Donald Sutherland. When celebrities pass we may sometimes feel the loss more keenly than would seem reasonable for a stranger. I never met him even though I saw many of his films. … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Popular music & culture | Tagged Academy Awards, Donald Sutherland, Gary Oldman, JFK, Kiefer Sutherland, Oliver Stone | Leave a comment

Spaceman is lightyears away from Operaman

Posted on April 24, 2024 by barczablog

After a friend described Spaceman as Adam Sandler’s best film I had to have a look, especially given that nobody I know takes Sandler seriously, and quite a few grimace at the mention of his name. I recently quoted CS … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Dance, theatre & musicals | Tagged Adam Sandler, Anger Management, Claude Debussy, comedy, criticism, CS Lewis, Eddie Murphy, Franz Kafka, improv, improvization, Jack Nicholson, Operaman, Pelleas et Melisande, Robert Altman, saturday night live, Spaceman | Leave a comment