“The Red Violin” (“Le violin rouge”) starts with an auction at Duval in Montreal of a mysterious red-painted instrument, whereupon the film constructs a few backstories, one per century, that trace the path of the violin and the curious fates of those who encounter it.
It starts out in 17th century Italy with a fortune teller reading, and then from a monastery in 18th century Austria a boy, in a family speaking both French and German, becomes a virtuoso but collapses and dies (of stage fright, perhaps) at an audition. The violin is buried with the boy but is found by gypsies and carried to England. There, a flamboyant violinist Frederick Pope (Jason Flemyng) carries on an affair with a mysterious writer, who undoes him while he plays, and then precipitates and end paralleling her own fiction.
Then it makes an Oceanic voyage and winds up in China during Chairman Mao’s cultural revolution of “absolute justice.” There is an odd discussion of how western classical music is abstract. bookish and self-indulgent and does not relate to “the people”. There is even to be a “record collection buring” when the violin is found.
Samuel L. Jackson plays the connoisseur who “investigates” the mysterious violin just before the auction, which rushes toward a Hitchcock-like finish.
The original music is by John Corigliano, with Joshua Bell playing much of the music, and Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the moody score.
The film is in French, Italian, German and Chinese (the film’s structure provides the opportunity) with subtitles (the Montreal scenes are in English) and is directed by Francois Girard, and was distributed by Lionsgate in 1998. The DVD is an older one, as it has Lionsgate’s older trademark.
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