Bizet: The Pearl Fishers (2016)

Hasan Minhaj: Homecoming King

Comic Hasan Minhaj of "The Daily Show" shares personal stories about racism, immigrant parents, prom night horrors and more in this stand-up special.

Unacknowledged

Dr. Steven Greer presents brand new top-secret evidence supporting extraterrestrial contact, including witness testimony, classified documents, and UFO footage, while also exploring the consequences of ruthlessly enforcing such secrecy.

The Farthest

The captivating tales of the people and events behind one of humanity's greatest achievements in exploration: NASA's Voyager mission.

The Ideal

Octave Parango, the former concept creator/editor of 99 francs has become a model scout in Moscow. This cynical hedonist leads a very pleasant life in the arms of young Russian models and in the private jets of his oligarch friends... until the day that he is contacted by The Ideal, the world's leading cosmetic's firm, embroiled in a huge media scandal. Our antihero has seven days to find a new muse by traveling through the confines of post-Communist Russia, under the orders of Valentine Winfield, a hard and authoritarian visual director.

Main Krishna Hoon

In answer to an orphan boy's prayers, the divine Lord Krishna comes to Earth, befriends the boy, and helps him find a loving family.

Rememory

The widow of a wise professor stumbles upon one of his inventions that's able to record and play a person's memory.

Prevenge

Ruth is a pregnant woman on a killing spree. It's her misanthropic unborn baby dictating Ruth's actions, holding society responsible for the absence of a father.

Appointment with Death

Emily Boynton, the stepmother to three children, blackmails the family lawyer into destroying a second will of her late husband that would have freed the children from her dominating influence. She takes herself, the children, and her daughter-in-law on holiday to Europe and the Holy Land. At a dig, Emily is found dead and Hercule Poirot investigates.

The Brigade

Bénédicte Meursault, a female firefighter, has just been transferred to a small fire brigade in the South of France. She is welcomed by Philippe, 45, the wise captain of the brigade. Soon after being introduced to the men, the young woman jumps into action. Unfortunately, while rescuing the victims of a terrible car crash, she does not find one of the injured who was ejected thirty meters away. Now the man is in hospital in a coma and he may die because of her. Completely upset, Bénédicte decides to resign but Philippe dissuades her from doing it.

Tracy Morgan: Staying Alive

In his first special since his serious car accident, Tracy Morgan cracks jokes about life in a coma, his second marriage and his family's dark side.

Lord, Give Me Patience

An ultraconservative family father must spend a weekend with his dysfunctional children for the burial of his wife.

Girls on Top 2

Inken and Lucy are facing hard times when their parents' money is radically cut off. Together with Lena, who is fed up with her boyfriend, they desperately search for money, an apartment and love. But because each individual point is difficult to realize on its own, the girls decide to kill all three birds with one stone for the sake of simplicity. The solution: they need rich, nice boys with suitable living space - and they need them now! But until then, horrendous rents, false identities and sleazy neighbors put their friendship to the test.

Digging for Fire

Tim and Lee are married with a young child. The chance to stay at a fancy home in the Hollywood Hills is complicated by Tim's discovery of a bone and a rusty old gun in the yard. Tim is excited by the idea of a mystery, but Lee doesn't want him to dig any further, preferring that he focus on the family taxes, which he promised to do weeks ago. This disagreement sends them on separate and unexpected adventures over the course of a weekend, as Tim and his friends seek clues to the mystery while Lee searches for answers to the bigger questions of marriage and parenthood.

Love in Bora Bora

Valentine is convinced she’s in love with Jérôme, her best friend and work partner. She decides to share her feelings with him while they’re away in Bora Bora on a business trip. But there’s a bad surprise in store: Jérôme’s new girlfriend, Céleste, has decided to tag along. Valentine will have to put up a real fight to win over the love of her life, under the amused gaze of Marc, their guide in the “lovers’ paradise.” But as the days roll by, Valentine realizes she was wrong about Jérôme, and discovers true love elsewhere…

Viper’s Nest 2

When Claire returns from Burkina Faso, she is totally transformed and her girlfriends barely recognize her. Cheryl discovers Martin is cheating on her yet again and for her, this time it's the last straw: she files for divorce. Anouk, also unhappy with her love life, threatens to develop an eating disorder. Roelien, however, accepts Evert's wedding proposal. Then, a fatal and thoroughly bizarre accident transports the girlfriends to the snowy mountaintops of Austria...

Keeping Up with the Joneses

An ordinary suburban couple finds it’s not easy keeping up with the Joneses – their impossibly gorgeous and ultra-sophisticated new neighbors – especially when they discover that Mr. and Mrs. “Jones” are covert operatives.

The Ballad of Lefty Brown

Aging sidekick Lefty Brown has ridden with Eddie Johnson his entire life. But when a rustler kills Eddie, Lefty is forced from his partner’s shadow and must confront the ugly realities of frontier justice.

Quel bravo ragazzo

On his deathbed, a powerful Mafia boss names his estranged son heir to his criminal empire: however, his men discover too late that the son at issue is an idiotic manchild.

Don't Think Twice

An improv group deals with several crises, including the loss of their lease and one member hitting the big time.

Love at First Child

Gabriell is a single mother, her 17-year-old daughter Claire is pregnant, however the child's father Simon has no desire to be involved with his future baby. When Gabrielle takes matters into her own hands and asks Simon's father Ange for help, an unexpected relationship begins.

Boston

The history of the Boston Marathon from its humble origins starting with only 15 runners, to the first female runners, through the tragedy in 2013, and ultimately the triumph of 2014.

iBoy

After an accident, Tom wakes from a coma to discover that fragments of his smart phone have been embedded in his head, and worse, that returning to normal teenage life is impossible because he has developed a strange set of super powers.

A Tiger Walks

A tiger escapes from a circus truck as it passes by a small town, and hides itself in the surrounding woods. This throws the town into a panic and everyone wants the animal killed immediately, except for the daughter of the sheriff. She wants to capture the tiger and put it in a zoo, thereby saving the tiger's life. Her determination starts a nationwide campaign among children to raise the money to buy the tiger from the circus, but first, she, her father and an Indian tiger trainer must find the tiger before the National Guard do, who have orders to kill it on sight.

The Song

Aspiring singer-songwriter Jed King struggles to catch a break and escape the long shadow of his father, a country music legend. After reluctantly accepting a gig at a local vineyard harvest festival, Jed is love-struck by the vineyard owner’s daughter, Rose, and a romance quickly blooms. Soon after their wedding, Jed writes Rose “The Song,” which becomes a breakout hit. Thrust into a life of stardom and a world of temptation in the form of fellow performer Shelby Bale, Jed’s life and marriage begin to fall apart.

Queen of Earth

Two women retreat to a lake house to get a break from the pressures of the outside world, only to realize how disconnected from each other they have become, allowing their suspicions to bleed into reality.

New Kids Nitro

Gerrie, Richard, Rikkert, Robbie and Barry from Maaskantje are in a big fight with the village of Schijndel. When a zombie kills someone from Brabant, things get out of hand.

True Memoirs of an International Assassin

After a publisher changes a writer's debut novel about a deadly assassin from fiction to nonfiction, the author finds himself thrust into the world of his lead character, and must take on the role of his character for his own survival.

The Good Witch's Gift

Almost as soon as Jake and Cassie decide to get married on Christmas Eve, complications arise.

Beyond the Gates

Two estranged brothers reunite at their missing father's video store to liquidate the property and sell off his assets. As they dig through the store, they find a VCR board game titled 'Beyond the Gates' that holds a connection to their father's disappearance and deadly consequences for anyone who plays it.

Betting on Zero

Controversial hedge fund titan Bill Ackman is on a crusade to expose global nutritional giant Herbalife as the largest pyramid scheme in history while Herbalife execs claim Ackman is a market manipulator out to bankrupt them and make a killing off his billion dollar short.

The Darkness

A family returns from a Grand Canyon vacation with a supernatural presence in tow.

Like Mother, Like Daughter

An attention-craving mother nearing 50, unemployed and living with her pregnant daughter and son-in-law, suddenly finds herself with child, too...

Pusher II

Tonny is released from prison - again. This time he has his mind set on changing his broken down life, but that is easier said than done.

Endless Love

Sparks fly when a humble housekeeper crosses paths with a wealthy surgeon, but a devastating truth puts their relationship to the test.

Nina

The story of the late jazz musician and classical pianist Nina Simone including her rise to fame and relationship with her manager Clifton Henderson.

The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir

Ajatashatru Lavash Patel has lived all his life in a small Mumbai neighborhood tricking people with street magic and fakir stunts. He sets out on a journey to find his estranged father but instead gets dragged on a never-ending adventure.

Airport 1975

When an in-flight collision incapacitates the pilots of an airplane bound for Los Angeles, stewardess Nancy Pryor is forced to take over the controls. From the ground, her boyfriend Alan Murdock, a retired test pilot, tries to talk her through piloting and landing the 747 aircraft. Worse yet, the anxious passengers — among which are a noisy nun and a cranky man — are aggravating the already tense atmosphere.

Arrhythmia

Oleg is a young gifted paramedic. His wife Katya works as a nurse at the hospital emergency department. She loves Oleg, but is fed up with him caring more about patients than her. She tells him she wants a divorce. The new head of Oleg’s EMA department is a cold-hearted manager who’s got new strict rules to implement. Oleg couldn’t care less about the rules – he’s got lives to save; his attitude gets him in trouble with the new boss. The crisis at work coincides with the personal life crisis. Caught up between their patients, alcohol-fueled off-shifts, and an evolving health care system, Oleg and Katya have to find the binding force that will keep them together.

Mefistofele

The director, Roland Schwab, has created his version of Hell. The set is like a high iron walled hanger and the stage is continually occupied with people who look like fugitives from Mad Max and who interact with Mefistofele. The orchestra and choir are wonderful. Rene Pape gives a nuanced interpretation with a certain amount of sardonic humour under the evil. His singing and acting are first rate, as is that of Kristine Opolais and Joseph Calleja.

Poulenc's The Human Voice / Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle

Running through Bartók’s disenchanted tale, whose haunting music was initially condemned as unplayable, and the expression of despair in Poulenc’s monologue, the director Krzysztof Warlikowski perceives a shared dramatic thread, a shared feminine consciousness and a shared sense of imprisonment and suffocation: for the woman who penetrates the confines of Bluebeard’s castle and Elle, the woman who clings to a telephone conversation with a man as the only thing worth living for, are condemned to share the same fate. And this man she speaks to, does he really exist? Unless the director has interpreted Cocteau’s words to the letter and the telephone has become a “terrifying weapon that leaves no trace, makes no noise”…

Berg: Wozzeck

Based on real events and drawing on Georg Büchner's revolutionary play, Alban Berg's Wozzeck turns a grimly tragic narrative of violence and murder into one of the most powerful and original operas of the 20th century. Berg's uncompromising portrayal of brutality and madness generated much controversy, but the significance of Wozzeck was soon recognised; its compelling lyrical expansiveness, large-scale dramatic gestures and remarkable musical structures producing music of overwhelming emotional intensity. The Financial Times declared this to be 'a beautiful, moving, engrossing production… this is a consummate Wozzeck, blending clarity, lyricism, compassion and crushing force.'

Alban Berg - Wozzeck

The soldier Wozzeck (Christian Gerhaher) flits through a world that he is unable to decipher. The doctor torments him with absurd medical experiments; the captain humiliates and ridicules him. And Wozzeck’s lover, Marie (Gun-Brit Barkmin), with whom he has a child, cuckolds him with the drum major. Wozzeck becomes a murderer, stabbing Marie to death. Georg Büchner’s drama fragment, on which Alban Berg based his first opera, is an unflinching case study of social injustice and human suffering. But it is also a grotesque piece that thrives on exaggeration – and in which only a fine line separates the unfathomable from the ridiculous. Accordingly, director Andreas Homoki forgoes all realism.

Rigoletto

A Victor Hugo play, haunting and scandalous, provided the inspiration for Verdi’s mid-career masterpiece. A vengeful but misguided court jester strives to save his daughter from a duke’s licentious clutches, but can't part with the feeling that a curse looms over all of his actions. In Rigoletto, the composer introduces several of his most iconic arias and duets—as well as an 11th-hour quartet that counts among the finest moments in opera.

The Metropolitan Opera: Don Giovanni

Simon Keenlyside smolders dangerously in the title role of Mozart’s version of the legend of Don Juan, creating a vivid portrait of a man who is a law unto himself, and all the more dangerous for his eternally seductive allure. Adam Plachetka is his occasionally unruly servant Leporello. It’s when Giovanni tangles with Donna Anna (Hibla Gerzmava) that things start to unravel, aided by the reappearance of Donna Elvira (Malin Byström), who is determined not to let her seducer go. With Paul Appleby as Don Ottavio, Donna Anna’s eternally steadfast fiancé. Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi leads the Met Orchestra and Chorus.

Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor

When Sir John Falstaff decides that he wants to have a little fun he writes two letters to a pair of Window wives: Mistress Ford and Mistress Page. When they put their heads together and compare missives, they plan a practical joke or two to teach the knight a lesson. But Mistress Ford's husband is a very jealous man and is pumping Falstaff for information of the affair. Meanwhile the Pages' daughter Anne is besieged by suitors.

The ROH Live: Otello

On a June night in 2017, opera lovers thronged to the Royal Opera House in London to hear tenor Jonas Kaufmann, recently acclaimed by The Daily Telegraph as the world s greatest tenor, make his eagerly anticipated debut in the title role of Otello Verdi s greatest and most demanding role for tenor voice. As the New York Times wrote Mr. Kaufmann made his debut in the part, and he calmly, confidently sang it for the ages.

Verdi Otello

Desdemona in Verdi's Otello was a career role for soprano Renata Tebaldi, from her first operatic performance outside of Italy to her final appearance on the opera stage. Between those landmarks she performed the role nearly 100 times all over the world and made studio audio recordings that became reference recordings for the role. This 1962 production with the Deutsche Oper Berlin and Giuseppe Patane was planned as a media event from the outset and blessedly captures a consummate artist in a signature role at the peak of her gifts.

Aria

Ten short pieces directed by ten different directors, including Ken Russell, Jean-Luc Godard, Robert Altman, Bruce Beresford, and Nicolas Roeg. Each short uses an aria as soundtrack/sound, and is an interpretation of the particular aria.

Viva Vivaldi

Viva Vivaldi! is a concert by the Italian mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli interspersing arias from the 20 surviving operas of Vivaldi with two concertos. Given with the early music ensemble Il Giardino Armonico before a very appreciative audience in the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, the performance is part of Bartoli's exploration of the Venetian composer's opera music which also includes The Vivaldi Album. There is a startling dynamic energy, which contrasts powerfully with the more restrained interpretations by singers such as Emma Kirkby. Bartoli's natural Italian and the live atmosphere of Maria Grazia d'Alessio's oboe gives her interpretation of the quietly haunting and melodically rich "Non ti Lusinghi la Crudeltade" from Tito Manlio a particular piquancy. The Flautino Concerto is a most attractive interlude, while the more famous Lute/Violin Concerto beguiles with its exquisite lyricism.

Alceste

John Eliot Gardiner conducts Gluck’s 1776 French version of “Alceste” at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. Soprano Anne Sofie von Otter takes the title role of Alceste, Queen of Thessaly, who offers to die at the hands of the gods in place of her husband, Admète (Paul Groves), so that the people will not lose their king. Alceste is then saved from the underworld by Hercule (Dietrich Henschel).

John Adams: Nixon in China

John Adams’s groundbreaking work vividly brings to life US President Nixon’s 1972 visit to the People’s Republic of China. Peter Sellars’s Metropolitan Opera production, based on his 1987 world-premiere staging, features choreography by Mark Morris and stars James Maddalena as Nixon, Robert Brubaker as Chairman Mao, Janis Kelly as First Lady Pat Nixon, Russell Braun as Chinese Premier Chou En-lai, and Kathleen Kim as Chiang Ch’ing, Mao’s wife. From the pomp of the public displays to the intimacy of the protagonists most private moments, Adams, Sellars and librettist Alice Goodman reveal the real characters behind the headlines in this landmark American opera.

Beethoven · Fidelio

A tribute to marriage coming from a bachelor is a tad suspicious. But for Beethoven the idealization of the woman-bride was heartfelt and sincere. It has always been a unique opera starring a courageous wife who wows audiences. Fidelio is a moral title, associated with the ideals of liberty of the French Enlightenment. Nobility and commoners are united in their thirst for justice against the oppression of power. For once the faithful consort of a desaparecido wins her battle against a treacherous tyrant, and the collective joy truly is “nameless”, as is sung on the stage. Especially because the “our heroes to the rescue” finale is recounted by the triumphant symphonic flair of the quintessential musician. Beethoven really does bring the world to collapse at the conclusion of this opera, which begins like a delightful little comedy, but which scales and transcends all the summits of the dramatic-musical art.

Chabrier: The Star

L’Étoile did much to establish Chabrier as a major force on the Parisian stage and his contemporary Henri Duparc praised him specifically for creating a French comic genre, both funny and musical – described as something of a French Die Meistersinger. The fanciful story is set in an imaginary kingdom and all, naturally, ends well. However, despite the slight plot line L’Étoile is something of a pivotal work, a unique example of French 19th-century light opera, orchestrated with great sophistication and flooded with gossamer wit.

The Ghosts of Versailles

What happened to Figaro and his friends after the events told in Rossini’s and Mozart’s operas? One possible sequel is told in John Corigliano’s “grand opera buffa” The Ghosts of Versailles—an uproariously funny and deeply moving work inspired by Beaumarchais’s third Figaro play, La Mère Coupable, and commissioned by the Met to celebrate its 100th anniversary. This telecast captures its world premiere run, conducted by James Levine. Håkan Hagegård is Beaumarchais, Figaro’s creator, who is deeply in love with Marie Antoinette (Teresa Stratas in a heart-searing performance) and determined to rewrite history and save her from the guillotine. A young Renée Fleming, at the beginning of her international career, sings the unfaithful Rosina. Gino Quilico is the wily Figaro who tries to take matters in his own hands, and Marilyn Horne stops the show as the exotic entertainer Samira.

Carmen

A film version of the famous Bizet opera, where a soldier (Don Jose) falls in love with a beautiful factory worker (Carmen), but she does not reciprocate his feelings.

Madame Butterfly

Cio-Cio-San, a young Japanese geisha, seeks to fulfill her dreams through marriage to an American naval officer. Her faith in their future is shattered by his empty vows and the loss she endures touches something deep within us all.

Death in Venice

Gustav Von Aschenbach, a passionate composer, arrives in Venice as a result of wanderlust and there meets a young man by whose beauty he becomes obsessed.

Rigoletto

This tragic story revolves around the licentious Duke of Mantua, his hunch-backed court jester Rigoletto, and Rigoletto's beautiful daughter Gilda. The opera's original title, La maledizione (The Curse), refers to the curse placed on both the Duke and Rigoletto by a courtier whose daughter had been seduced by the Duke with Rigoletto's encouragement. The curse comes to fruition when Gilda likewise falls in love with the Duke and eventually sacrifices her life to save him from the assassins hired by her father.

Nabucco

St. Margarethen is a magnificent structure and a grand setting for Nabucco. This venue, along with the gorgeous costumes, spectacular lighting, lasers and pyrotechnics made for one grand, five star production! This is reason enough to see it and it must be an advantage to view it on DVD.--It would probably be harder to digest the whole spectacle if you were actually sitting in the audience, as there is so much to take in. The whole cast was in great form, both in singing and acting. Simon Yang as Zaccaria and Igor Morosow as Nabucco were excellent. Gabriella Morigi was a convincing Abigail who got better and better. Bruno Ribeiro as Ismaele and Elisabeth Kulman as Fenena were great, too.