Plot
 | This article needs a plot summary.(March 2022) |
| Dance of the Seven Veils | |
|---|---|
| Screenplay by | Henry Reed Ken Russell |
| Directed by | Ken Russell |
| Starring | Christopher Gable Judith Paris Kenneth Colley |
| Music by | Richard Strauss |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original languages | English German |
| Production | |
| Producer | Ken Russell |
| Cinematography | Peter Hall |
| Editor | Dave King |
| Running time | 59 minutes |
| Production company | BBC |
| Original release | |
| Network | BBC1 |
| Release | 15 February 1970 |
Dance of the Seven Veils is a 1970 British television film about German composer Richard Strauss. The film, directed and produced by Ken Russell, was only screened once by the BBC. Following condemnation for its gratuitous sex scenes and the depiction of the composer as a Nazi sympathiser, Strauss' estate took out a legal injunction, banning the use of the composer's music on the film's soundtrack.
In February 2020, with the expiration of the composer's copyright after more than 70 years since Strauss died, the film was shown at a special screening event in Cumbria, England hosted by Russell's widow.
| This article needs a plot summary.(March 2022) |
The film was made on location near Russell's home at Skiddaw in the Lake District. [1] "One of the purposes of making the film was to shock complacent critics and viewers who sit in front of their sets for hours on end watching cocoa advertisements. I was simply setting out to make a film about Richard Strauss, and I felt that everything I showed was necessary for presenting my idea of this man," Russell told Peter Waymark of The Times in February 1970. "I wanted strong, hard outlines to bring out aspects of this man and his work that to my mind have been overlooked." The composer "was a self advertising, vulgar, commercial man." [2]
The film was shown on BBC1 on 15 February 1970. It created a sufficient outcry for 20 Conservative backbenchers to table a motion objecting to it after the television screening. It was shown at the House of Commons the following month. Huw Wheldon, then managing director of BBC Television who was present at the screening, defended the film. [3] It was only shown once by the BBC. [1] The Strauss estate was so outraged by the film that an injunction was taken out, banning the use of Strauss's music on the soundtrack, effectively preventing any further broadcasts because the film can be seen but it cannot be heard. [1]
"I hated it so much" said The Observer. [4] "I don't deny its power," wrote Nancy Banks-Smith in The Guardian. [5] The campaigner Mary Whitehouse commented: "There was gratuitous sex and violence of the most outlandish kind". [2]
When the copyright of Strauss' music expired, the film was reshown at Keswick Film Festival in Cumbria's Theatre by the Lake. The evening was hosted by Russell's widow, Lisi. [1] [6]
Richard Georg Strauss was a German composer and conductor best known for his tone poems and operas. Considered a leading composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras, he has been described as a successor of Richard Wagner and Franz Liszt. Along with Gustav Mahler, he represents the late flowering of German Romanticism, in which pioneering subtleties of orchestration are combined with an advanced harmonic style.
Henry Kenneth Alfred Russell was a British film director, known for his pioneering work in television and film and for his flamboyant and controversial style. His films were mainly liberal adaptations of existing texts, or biographies, notably of composers of the Romantic era. Russell began directing for the BBC, where he made creative adaptations of composers' lives which were unusual for the time. He also directed many feature films independently and for studios.
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This is a list of British television related events from 1970.
Seven Veils or Dance of the Seven Veils may refer to:
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