My initial reaction after watching the movie was that it was very interesting to see how the opera started and progressed to what it is today over the years. I learned that the Opera started as very small performances at weddings and grew into enormous productions that the people of the cities would take very seriously. The town would build enormous and elaborate colosseums to host the operas that could hold thousands of people that wanted to see the performance.
A part in particular that I liked was when the narrator was explaining how Opera was a huge form of nationalism for the people of Italy and they would use it as a tool to show their pride in their country and express their radical views during past times of war. He said that the Opera houses in the cities were always a main target for destruction when people invaded because they were so symbolic to towns.
It was explained that Operas used to be controversial and when ever an opera was written about something extreme or political, they would be rejected and were not that popular. The opera stories grew over the years and eventually the main story lines in Operas were all about tragic romance and love and contained a lot more violence and death than before. Everyone started to enjoy those types of operas more since they were a lot more captivating and sometimes relatable. That related to us in modern society present day because we all enjoy and go see the huge blockbusters that come out and most of them are always very emotional and tragic dramas that people get very emotionally in tune with. Everyone seems to like productions and movies more when the action is over the top along with the details and effects, and the same went for the people back then with the heavily detailed and elaborate productions that would take place in the operas.
