Masochistic

Tokyo Noise - by Erik Pauser, Kristian Petri, Jan Röed, Johan Söderberg (2002)

"Tokyo at the beginning of the 21st century, its inhabitants and artists. An observation and diagnosis of the modern Japanese metropolis: the singularity of unusual creative individuals is merely a response to the majority Japanese society. Even this can appear as an eccentric work of art. So where do the borders lie? A psychologist talks about the autistic way of life burgeoning in the dense population of the country. A noise musician speaks of her inspiration from sado-masochistic bondage as an art form. A programmer specialising in computer games assures us: I can distinguish our world and “the other side”!

Others have praised this Covent Garden Salome for its dramatic impact, and with good cause. The direcotr, Luc Bondy, has translated the opera into tortured terms that the painter Egon Schiele would recognize; the sexuality is masochistic, frenzied, and self-destructive. John the Baptist is no solemn stick of wood – Bryn Terfel makes him as agonized and writhing as Salome herself. But the brunt of the Expressionist labor falls on the cat-like Malfitano, whose descent into madness is neither campy nor stagey. She's a great actress, and she adapts to the stylized movements straight out of Nosferatu with total conviction. (Only the opening scene is weak, since her girlish figure can't completely disguise that she is considerably too old to be the Judean princess.)… By Santa Fe Listener