Most films about composers are awful. Really awful. Liszt, Chopin, Beethoven, Mozart--all dumbed down or hyped up by Hollywood. And then there's Ken Russell's desecrations of Tchaikovksy and Mahler. By comparison this film might have come from another planet, not just a different country. I first saw it 35 years ago, and was delighted to find it as engrossing and moving as it was then. It's about the music, stupid. But it's also about how grinding, tedious, and incredibly demanding Bach's everyday life was, while he wrote and performed some of the greatest creations of the human mind. And also how he was a family man, living an intense domestic life. Yes it's austere and demanding. But stay with it, it's worth it.
