The Music Lovers

The Music Lovers is a 1970 British biographical film directed by Ken Russell. The screenplay by Melvyn Bragg, based on Beloved Friend, a collection of personal correspondence edited by Catherine Drinker Bowen and Barbara von Meck, focuses on the life and career of 19th century Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. It was one of a series of films, including Elgar (1962), Mahler (1974) and Lisztomania (1975), delineating the lives of classical... more

The Music Lovers is a 1970 British biographical film directed by Ken Russell. The screenplay by Melvyn Bragg, based on Beloved Friend, a collection of personal correspondence edited by Catherine Drinker Bowen and Barbara von Meck, focuses on the life and career of 19th century Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. It was one of a series of films, including Elgar (1962), Mahler (1974) and Lisztomania (1975), delineating the lives of classical composers the director made from an often idiosyncratic standpoint. Much of the film is without dialogue and the story is presented in flashbacks, nightmares, and fantasy sequences set to Tchaikovsky's music. As a child, the composer sees his mother die horribly, forcibly immersed in scalding water as a supposed cure for cholera, and is haunted by the scene throughout his musical career. Despite his difficulty in establishing his reputation, he attracts Madame Nadezhda von Meck as his patron. His marriage to the nymphomaniacal Antonina... less