A great documentary on clasical music and an unwatchable Russian film

Ethan Hawke's simpler, low-budget documentary Seymour: An Introduction (yes, we get the reference, thanks), is a completely charming and absorbing look at a brilliant piano teacher in Manhattan, Seymour Bernstein, a man who had a very promising career as a performer which he abandoned in his 30s or 40s to devote the rest of his career to teaching just a few very high-end students. The documentary, which includes a lot of interviews with Bernstein, a captured very intelligent discussion between Bernstein and one of his former students and NY Times writer Michael Kimmelman, and a few interviews about Bernstein. It doesn't totally unravel the mystery as to why Bernstein gave up performance - he indicates he suffered from stagefright - and it leaves his personal life largely to the side - but what really makes the film great are the many segments of his working with his students, including a terrific master class, and a final segment in which he performs (first time in decades) before a small group of Hawke's acting students in the Steinway grand hall - and he narrates as he plays. His insights into music and performance are extraordinary; even those not well versed in the classical piano repertoire will get a sense of the nuances of performance and the small things that performers at the highest level can do, must do, to attain excellence (and, you could add, to finally break free of their mentor and find their own style). The demands on professional musicians, we see, are almost beyond comprehension - no wonder they have stage fright; they should! The closing credits list all the pieces; I almost wish - and I usually don't feel this way, would rather just have the film without intrusion - that they could have put a sub- or super-title on the screen with the name of the piece as each was performed.

A note on the recent Russian film Hard to Be a God, which got great reviews - and yet - well, though they are entirely different films it's similar to Mad Max Fury Road in that it creates an entire alternate world, which is an incredible accomplishment in itself; in this case, the world is supposedly on some other planet and we are among scientists viewing this world as though through a scope; OK, but the world is the most disgusting, repulsive place you can imagine and I could not imagine watching it for the full 3 hours and gladly abandoned this ordeal after 20 or so minutes.