Tchaikovsky: Swan Lake

oh my gosh! this is the most magnificent production to date! the scenery. the costumes, the stars! I cannot believe the magnificence of this dvd. who cares how to rate it! never have I seen anything this to date. just enjoy! it brings tears to my eyes.

My mother asked me to buy her every version of Swan Lake I can find by the Russian ballet. I found 3 versions on Amazon. The videos are good quality and she loved all the productions.

It's OK, just another version of swan Lake.

Svetlana is the best as usual, but her partner is awful. He is too immature for her professional level. He has no connection with anyone he dances with. I've seen this choreography live with Svetlana Zakharova and David Hallberg. There were some synchronized dancing sections and David executed perfectly, while this male dancer is unable to synchronize any of those sections. Bad performance, Svetlana alone can't save it. This recording should have been of Svetlana and David. Another annoying thing is the recording zooming in and out too much. During critical technical dance execution moments, videographer should never zoom in on the dancer face! But here they do. The focus is the whole body, dancing is not on the face! This performance is a disappointment knowing how great Svetlana is at live performances.

I have 4 DVD performances (different companies and dancers) of Swan Lake, including Fonteyn & Nureyev. This is the best.

A beautiful recreation of the tragic story of Doña Inés de Castro. The Finale is chilling.

The reconfigured ending is the least of this "Swan Lake"'s problems; the score has been fiddled-with throughout. The problem is that the revision is so half-assed. And that there is no --as in zero-- chemistry between the leads. Rodkin is no virtuoso, to be sure, but I lay the blame at Zakharova's feet (among other appendages). She is an exquisite dancer, but she spends the entire ballet being exquisite, and behaving as if being partnered were an imposition. This is as soulless a "Swan Lake" as I never hope to see again.The audience is over-enthused, killing any momentum that could have accrued, if allowed to. There is some nice work for the swan contingent, but it never adds up to much. And there's a great, athletic fool and an impressive if generalized Rothbart, doing more than his share of the dancing. But even the 36 fouettes fail to convince. This swan is canned goods. hfs

I really wanted to like this. You’ve got one of the best scores ever composed along with one of the best swans to ever grace the stage. So what happened? Obviously the dancing was superb. Stunning sets. But that’s where it falls apart. No passion ... none. No understandable miming to explain the story. Just ... blah. Skip this one and pick up La Scala’s Lake with Zakharova/Bolle to see a lovely telling with the same principal swan.

Needs a couple of viewings to grasp the whole story,,, enjoyable choreography,, something different but not to modern, and some glorious Tchaikovsky music,, probably not that well known to some people,, so a good all rounf experience..

Great Christmas entertainment ! Will there be another one next Christmas?