Nureyev's Don Quixote / Lanchbery, Nureyev, Helpmann, Aldous,

A must for ballet lovers
I bought this as I loved the music by Minkus and bought the CD of it last year. Because of it I bought the DVD of the ballet and it is wonderful and this is Nureyev at his best. A very colourful, fast moving and exhilarating ballet beautifully produced. All the scenery and costumes are Spanish.

Ballet DVD
The soundtrack on my copy was terrible with music fading in and out throughout the 2 hr + performance. I had the volume turned up as high as possible but at times the music was barely audible. The soundtrack was so bad, so irritating, so annoying that I doubt I will ever watch the DVD again.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:
Essential. Often called the greatest dance film ever made, and easy to see why when witnessing Nureyev's blazing solos.--Octavio Roca, Dance critic

Buy It!
This DVD is a spectacular restoration of one of the best ballet films of all time. It has a terrific performance by Nureyev, and features the great Lucette Aldous, a perfect match for Nureyev in charisma and technique. The DVD also has numerous bonus materials, including a "making of" documentary and side-by-side before-and-after scenes to illustrate the restoration. I also have the VHS and laser disk of this movie, and they are both dark and dirty looking compared to this beautiful DVD. It's really a great improvement and well worth purchasing.

A rotten tomato in a golden box.
This is a relatively well-made ballet DVD among others. However, the cheesy performance really is not worth such a luxury. Compared to the fascinating 1988 Kirov version by Tatyana Terekhova and Farouk Ruzimatov, this one is on the kindergarten level, I'd say. I really don't know why Lucette Aldous was able to get a chance to play the leading role with her flat, robot-like performance. What's more, in the final act she seems to be totally exhausted with sore legs that couldn't stretch or even stand at all. I think the only reason Kultur Video made this DVD so well is simply because it presents Nureyev, whose name is supposed to attract lots of ballet fans (although I personally don't think his performance could compete with Ruzimatov's in the Kirov version). My own suggestion is that don't pick this version, if you are not a big Nureyev fan.