The Music Lovers

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is a composer and teacher in Moscow. He tries to conceal his homosexuality and decides to marry as a way of suppressing it. He marries Nina Milyukova, who admires him. Nina has expectations and an instability of her own, and the marriage becomes a disaster for both. Meanwhile Tchaikovsky is receiving financial support from a wealthy woman, Nadezhda von Meck, on condition that they never meet. Ken Russell's film rejects the shape of biography entirely. The narrative delivers the music through visual hallucination; while the works are played on stage the camera moves into images in the characters' minds. The manner is extravagant and deliberately excessive. Richard Chamberlain plays Tchaikovsky and Glenda Jackson plays Nina. Jackson's performance is the most discussed thing about it. Who it's for: Viewers who like Ken Russell, formal excess, and composer biographies. Who it's not for: The depiction of mental illness is uncomfortable and runs in the shapes of its period. Constructing homosexuality solely as a source of torment is also one-sided.