Filmed ‘Tosca’ Is an Involving and Entertaining Adaptation

Filmed opera performances have the advantage of front-row intimacy coupled with the loss of genuine opera-house acoustics--we get to closely watch singing actors’ faces, but we don’t get the resonance of voices and orchestra in a large theater.

Benoit Jacquot’s film of Puccini’s “Tosca” goes beyond previous opera films, which for the most part merely documented existing staged performances, though promising wider vistas--outdoor settings, for instance. Jacquot deals in real-world pictures of Roman venues and actual, bucolic scenery, too. But he adds other dimensions: black-and-white scenes from the sound-recording sessions alternating with the color-film action, the conductor, orchestra and principals in street clothes, addressing the microphones; the principals’ words spoken over some of the singing, indicating the characters’ thoughts.

Altogether, this is successful as a film, while at the same time being a most touching reconsideration of the familiar masterpiece.

Yes, masterpiece. What feisty musicologist Joseph Kerman called a “shabby little shocker” 50 years ago is indeed in the same class with “La Boheme” and “Turandot,” a class into which it has not automatically been put by its many critics. Furthermore, the present performance, sung passionately by Angela Gheorghiu, Roberto Alagna and Ruggero Raimondi, and conducted by Antonio Pappano, underlines that stature.

Bring out the handkerchiefs. The duets in Acts 1 and 3--the film wastes no time on intermissions and comes in at a trim 119 minutes--caress and refresh this beautiful music with an Italianate affection that makes it sound new. In the opening scene, the ardent vulnerability of the lovers is breathtaking--Gheorghiu and Alagna flirt and smooch with utter credibility, and their singing is an aural feast.

They achieve a similar plateau in Act 3, where “O dolci mani” crowns the musical climax and sets up the final tragedy. And they look as young and beautiful as they sound.

In tandem with Gheorghiu’s wary Tosca, Raimondi’s G. Gordon Liddy of a Scarpia provides the chills and cold blood in a harrowing second act of vivid colors and polished marble. Other directors’ cliches--the premeditated stabbing, the dressing of the corpse--are eschewed; Tosca kills Scarpia quickly and passionately and leaves without second thoughts.

Jacquot adds some contemporary touches to the scenario, for instance the black-and-white shots of the recording sessions and those Roman locations fleshing out some scenes--if you’ve never visited the Castel Sant’Angelo, you have now. None of this distracts, though the sound engineering is inconsistent. Besides the principals, the surrounding players are able and convincing. They include Enrico Fissore as a faceted Sacristan, Maurizio Muraro as the harassed Angelotti and David Cangelosi as Spoletta.

Conductor Antonio Pappano elicits colorful performances from the Orchestra & Chorus of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden as well from the cast.

Unrated. Times guidelines: some nongraphic violence in Act 2.

‘Tosca’

Angela Gheorghiu...Floria Tosca

Roberto Alagna...Mario Cavaradossi

Ruggero Raimondi...Baron Scarpia

An Avatar Films release. Director Benoit Jacquot. Producer Daniel Toscan, Du Plantier. Screenplay by Benoit Jacquot, after the libretto of Puccini’s opera. Cinematographer Romain Winding. Editor Luc Barnier. Costume designer Christian Gasc. Music Giacomo Puccini, conducted by Antonio Pappano. Set designer Sylvain Chauvelot. Running time: 1 hour, 59 minutes.

Exclusively at Laemmle’s Music Hall, 9036 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, (310) 274-6869; and Laemmle’s Playhouse 7, 673 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, (626) 844-6500.