A Night at the Opera

Digging once again into the deep archives of 20th century audiovisual history, Sergei Loznitsa crafts this elegant, ironic mini-portrait of the galas of Paris's Palais Garnier in the 1950s and 60s. With his typically masterful use of montage, and a minutely reconstructed soundtrack, Loznitsa revisits a socio-political microcosm that features adoring crowds and glimpses of Bardot, Cocteau, and Queen Elizabeth II amid the pomp and ceremony of Parisian high society.—Opéra national de Paris