“Opera as a subject for film peaked during the silent era, when movies were accustomed to non-stop music and a kind of melodramatic posturing that’s still taken as normal on many opera stages. But there’s no current shortage of film directors willing to do opera in its usual habitat, or even to write and stage new works.” And we’re not talking about filmed versions of La Boheme, either, but new operas written by real composers in collaboration with the directors. Maybe there’s hope for the mass appeal of the high arts yet.