Steve Schwartz writes:

>To the extent that there were two contemporary 18th-century composers
>named Mozart and Salieri, it's accurate - ie, not very.  It's mostly blood
>and thunder melodrama which plays ninepins with history and intellectual
>history under the promise of telling you something profound about the
>nature of genius.  It doesn't deliver.  It is undoubtedly one of the worst,
>most pretentious pieces of tripe it's been my misfortune to sit through.
>I had a much better time at Dumb and Dumber.

hmm...  I have 2 -VHS and 1 -DVD copies of Amadeus.  (I also have both "3
Tenors" and Andrea Bocelli, A Night in Tuscany all on DVD.) I do remember
ads for "Dumb and Dumber" but didn't go any further, so I couldn't compare
it to Amadeus as far as any "good time".  I enjoy Amadeus, a semiserious
study on human nature and snippets of some of the most glorious music ever
written, and most probably ever will be written, thrown in performed by Sir
Neville and colleagues.  What more can one expect and ask for? It may have
even turned some people onto to classical music, and therefore indirectly
benefit to all of us.  It certainly didn't do any harm.

Norman Schwartz
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