Shostakovich’s opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk was denounced by Stalin in 1936; his 1962 version, Katerina Izmailova, is only rarely performed. This extraordinary film by Mikhail Shapiro, which won a Palm d’Or at Cannes in 1967, stars Russian soprano Galina Vishnevskaya in the title role. There are no subtitles but a synopsis can be found here.

Very little footage of Vishnevskaya survives as much of it was destroyed when she and her husband Mtislav Rostropovich (the cellist) were sent into exile for harbouring the author and political refugee Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

The film is available on DVD and a CD of the original opera, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, sung by Vishnevskaya and conducted by Rostropovich, can also be found on Amazon, as can Vishnevskaya’s fascinating autobiography, Galina: a Russian Story.

More information on the film can be found here.

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