Warning: contains references to the surprises

Rating: Null/10 (6 February 2000)

A sentimental fantasy; not great, but worth seeing.
The wife of a Renaissance Italian violin maker is pregnant with her first child; her husband has been working to build _the_ greatest violin that his son, when born, can learn to play. His wife, shortly before birth, has a servant tell her fortune with Tarot cards; the prediction proves accurate but not in the way one expects. The woman and her newborn both die in childbirth. The movie traces the later journeys of this violin as it passes from musician to musician.
Joshua Bell, a young 20ish concert violinist noted for his flair with romantic music, plays on the sound track. The movie doesn't have so much "serious" music that those who don't usually listen to it will be turned off; the reverse could be more often true -- that some of those with an especial love of the violin and its serious repertoire may feel a little short-changed.
I've read a few other user comments and agree with those who remark that the transitions from one story episode to the next are somewhat rough. And agree that the episode with Kaspar Weiss is the most effective. The episode with an English violinist and his love, a female author, was almost worthy of a pulp fiction romance novel except it lacked enough credulity of gender roles for those times (or combining sexual and musical activities?). Oh, and the red varnish of the "Red Violin" -- terribly sentimental, romantic, and so fantastic as to be completely unrealistic. (Don't they feed these scripts through any technical editors? Or didn't it matter?)

A college freshman friend of mine who's a music major said she saw this 7 times and urged me to see it. Not bad, entertaining, but we have different tastes. In the demographics women in the 18-44 age ranges rate it about one whole point higher than men. Does that make this a "chick" movie?