A huge panorama of Wagner's life and work, from before the 1848 Revolution, through his exile in Switzerland, his rescue by the besotted King Ludwig II of Bavaria to the final triumph at Bayreuth. Wagner's radical musical and political ideas, his German nationalism and even his anti-Semitism are set in the context of his life and times.

The world premiere of this feature film by Tony Palmer was at the Rainbow Theater on July 5, 1974, in London. The original version cost over 120.000 USD *) to produce, but Cohen was not satisfied. He spent six months in England editing and rearranging the film to show the deeper elements in music, the conditions that produced it, and his interaction with the audiences. It contains songs from albums as well as concerts, including those of Berlin, Vienna, Copenhagen, and Israel in March and April 1972. It is a documentary rather than an art film. Color, 90 min. (Ira Nadel: Life in Art, p. 111; Dorman & Rawlins: Prophet of the Heart, p. 279)
According to information received in 2010 from Tony Palmer the production cost of the original film (his version) was around £30.000.

"Touring makes you crazy," Frank Zappa says, explaining that the idea for this film came to him while the Mothers of Invention were touring

本片主要的底本资源采自所罗门·伏尔科夫那本争议颇大的“肖斯塔科维奇口述自传”《见证》（
），全片以作曲家独白形式展开，契合原书的“口述”特征。电影脚本编写相当出彩，导演帕尔默也参与了脚本写作，伏尔科夫担任顾问。影片将俄罗斯二十世纪的悲剧历史和作曲家的创作心路交织在一起，大量运用象征性的影像，音乐运用和剪辑流畅，加深了影像的冲击力。影片主线围绕作曲家和斯大林展开，较有争议的段落是作曲家与独裁者在临终时的对话场景，展现了所谓历史正义和个人良知的冲突。全片长达2小时40分钟。

This film, made at the request of Maria Callas herself, was started in 1973, but wasn't finished until 12 years later. It includes eye-witness accounts by Franco Zeffirelli, Tito Gobbi, Luchino Visconti, Carlo Maria Giulini, Giuseppe Di Stefano and many others who knew her well.
It tells a story that was previously unknown, about a great singer who had been brought low by love, and whose career was unbelievably short when considered against her extraordinary worldwide reputation.
We witness on stage a broken woman who sings nakedly from her heart, about herself and her life, who acts with such incredible power and unashamed truth that we stagger back before what we know, in our hearts, is all of her. There's no artifice here; no vulgar posturings to which her absurd imitators - and there are many - aspire.
Maria - just a woman, who often spoke of Callas in the third person, in trouble, asking, begging sometimes, for our understanding and our love. She deserves it, because there was no greater singing actress in our time. And she was only 53 when she died.
The film has been hugely imitated, even copied, since it was first shown, by feature film and documentary makers. It remains the definitive study of a great singer and very special woman.

Celebrated filmmaker Tony Palmer follows Leonard Cohen on his 1972 European tour. The film, after extensive re-editing from its initial version, opened in London in 1974. It was shown on German television, but it disappeared for decades and was considered a lost film. Its original version, restored by the director, was released on DVD in 2010 and had its first theatrical release in 2017.

The Salzburg Festival has hosted every great star of the opera and concert hall, from Toscanini to Anne-Sophie Mutter, from Fischer-Dieskau to Barenboim, from Pollini to Mitsuko Uchida. In this film, the first to tell the story of this remarkable Festival, set in the birthplace of Mozart, director Tony Palmer has been granted unprecedented access to Austria's film archives. Highlights include performances of Jedermann from 1920 to the present day, featuring actors such as Maximilian Schell and Klaus Maria Brandauer; Don Giovanni (with Furtwängler in '54 and a controversial performance directed by Peter Sellars in the 1990s); a wealth of footage of Herbert von Karajan, including performances and never-before-seen home movies; and footage of the Nazi hierarchy at the Festival during the Second World War.