Word: fluted
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Thanks again to Bergman's usual collaborator, Cinematographer Sven Nykvist, The Magic Flute is ravishing to look at. The acting is exceptional, partly be cause the performers have been allowed to concentrate on nuance rather than volume. The music was recorded separately, so that when the sing ers open their mouths to sing, the action is as natural and spontaneous as if they were speaking. During the overture and between scenes, Bergman cuts to faces in the audience, returning continually to one, the wondering, wise countenance of a girl who seems ageless. Recalling the director's childhood memories...
...Magic Flute is traditionally considered an exaltation of the power of love. It is also about the transcendence of art and the liberating force of imagination - themes Bergman underscores...
Papageno's bells, Tamino's magic flute are talismans against the darkness. For Bergman, they are forces, as certain and necessary as love, to hold back the night...
When Tamino and Pamina embrace at the end, Bergman has the magic flute fly from Tamino's hand into Sarastro's, a lovely metaphor of universal regeneration, both of life...
Purists may be disconcerted to hear The Magic Flute sung in Swedish instead of German. The music is well per formed, but it is never quite as effective as Bergman's dramatic conception, which is to stage the opera like an 18th century production. Many scenes take place within the confines of a proscenium arch. Bergman even emphasizes the theatricality of the occasion by providing a few glimpses of the performers off stage: Sarastro studying Parsifal, Papageno asleep in his dressing room and almost missing his en trance cue. Curtains rise and descend, flats rumble away to be replaced...