La Bohème

This film version of Puccini's much-loved opera plays its absolutely straight and does a decent job of it. Re-creating 19th-century Paris in the studio, it preserves the tragic story of a starving artist's ill-fated love for an ailing seamstress without unnecessarily jazzing it up - but without adding very much either. The soaring melodies are present and correct as the camera lingers on two of the opera world's hot properties, Mexican tenor Rolando Villazón, who plays the poet Rodolfo, and Russian soprano Anna Netrebko as his consumptive love interest. Neither of them lacks charisma, though his hang-dog features seem rather more suited to comedy, and she's arguably too fiercely robust as the fast-fading Mimi. Still, alert direction captures the finer details of character interaction to convince us we're watching a genuine ensemble, even though several of the performers have been dubbed. Robert Dornhelm's film should be a safe bet for newcomers to opera, while aficionados should also enjoy it.