La Fille Mal Gardée ("The Unguarded Maiden"), perhaps the best-known work of composer Ferdinand Hérold, is here presented in a Royal Ballet production freely adapted, arranged and conducted by John Lanchbery. The unquestioned centre of attention is Royal Ballet superstar Lesley Collier who plays Lise, the beautiful farm girl whom her widowed mother (Brian Shaw) plans to marry to the eligible Alain (Garry Grant) despite Lise's love for young farmer Colas (Michael Coleman). This is a colourful pastoral romp with pause for tender and lyrical moments and plentiful opportunities for Collier to enchant her many admirers. Royal Ballet principal conductor Lanchbery-himself composer of the well-loved Tales of Beatrix Potter (1971)-brings all his flair for this sort of carefree entertainment to play and the result is delightful. Filmed for BBC television at Covent Garden in January 1981, the witty, energetic and romantic choreography is by Frederick Ashton (his dancing chickens are hilarious, as is Shaw's "clog dance" in Act Two) and the stage design by Osbert Lancaster, whose legacy adds charm to a much more recent BBC Royal Ballet film of Coppélia (2000). Hérold's score is filled with playfulness, melody and laughter, making this a very superior pantomime. -Gary S. Dalkin On the DVD: Presented at the original 4:3 TV ratio, the focus is soft throughout and details lacking in long shots are reduced to a formless blur. The image looks washed-out, with colours missing any sparkle or depth. The live stereo sound is much better, being detailed, full, and free of the hiss one might expect from a TV soundtrack of this vintage. [+]

Deborah Warner's 1995 production of Don Giovanni for Glyndebourne is characterised by a central portrayal of the Don as at once evil and sexually magnetic. Gilles Cachemille has at one at the same time a raffish charm and a deep mean-spiritedness-many Don Giovannis don't bully his servant nearly as much as this one, and Warner pushes his sinfulness all the way into sacrilege-apart from mocking the Commendatore's grave effigy, this Giovanni also has his way with a statue of the Madonna. Pieczonka's Elvira is at once stately and sensual-there is no sense of hysteria here, rather more of a deep sadness and sense of a ruined life. Page's Leporello is a wonderful long-faced clown; his catalogue aria is at once genuinely funny and a rather sadistic tease of Elvira. Though Kreizberg is working with authentic forces, the feel of his performance has a passionate gloominess that teeters on the brink of Romanticism without ever exceeding the work's adventurousness. The DVD comes with subtitles in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish, as well as a full printable text of the libretto. -Roz Kaveney.