Silent Era : Home Video Reviews

Silent Era Home Page > Home Video > Richard Wagner

Reviews of silent film releases on home video.
Copyright © 1999-2025 by Carl Bennett
and the Silent Era Company.
All Rights Reserved.

Richard
Wagner
(1913)

This biography of the German composer, directed by Carl Froelich, stars Giuseppe Becce as Wagner, with Manny Ziener, Miriam Howitz, Ernst Reicher, Olga Engl and Max Maximilian.

Gonzo Multimedia
2011 DVD edition

Silent Wagner (1913), color-toned black & white and black & white, 82 minutes total, BBFC Certification E, including Richard Wagner (1913), color-toned black & white and black & white, 82 minutes, BBFC Certification E.

Gonzo Multimedia, TPDVD171, UPC 5-060230-861142.
One single-sided, single-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 470 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at 6.6 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 60 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 stereo sound encoded at 256 Kbps audio bit rate (commentary); English language intertitles, no subtitles; 4 chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; unknown suggested retail price.
Release date: 13 December 2011.
Country of origin: England

Ratings (1-10): video: 7 / audio: 5 / additional content: 4 / overall: 6.

This DVD edition has been mastered from a 35mm print, presumably that held by Eye Film Instituut Nederland. The print presents a significant amount of dust, speckling, emulsion blemishes and scrapes, exposure fluctuations, frame jitters, and other print flaws. The original intertitles have been replaced with new English intertitles that unnessarily include added digital speckling and scratches.

The film is not presented with a music score and the only accompaniment will be the audio commentary.

Supplemental material includes audio commentary by Tony Palmer, director of Wagner (1983). We must take umbrage with Palmer over the significant number of factual errors and assumptions regarding early cinema history (not withstanding his knowledge of Wagner’s life, about which we know quite little) espoused in his commentary. Film historians intending to listen to the commentary will need to warn their neighbors of the possibility of loud outbursts of objections and expressions of disbelief that may be heard by them during the film.

Despite the foregoing, this is our recommended home video edition of the film. While published in England, the disc has actually been mastered in NTSC rather than PAL format.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD edition has been discontinued
and is . . .

Gonzo Multimedia
2015 DVD edition

Gonzo Multimedia,
unknown catalog number, UPC 5-060230-865409.
One single-sided, single-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 470 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at ? Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to ? fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 stereo sound encoded at ? Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $18.98 (US).
Release date: 31 March 2015.
Country of origin: England

This DVD edition has been mastered from a 35mm print, presumably that held by Eye Film Instituut Nederland.

The film may not be presented with a music score and the only accompaniment would be the audio commentary.

Supplemental material includes audio commentary by Tony Palmer, director of Wagner (1983).

This presumably identical edition to Gonzo’s 2011 disc is (if so) also recommended. It appears that this edition may have been rereleased (again) in 2024.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD edition is available from
GONZO MULTIMEDIA through . . .