Orpheus Paris' Montmartre) in search of his fortune and ultimately to attempt the rescue of his doomed love. The film adapts a widely known piece from Jacques Offenbach's comedic operetta "Orphée aux enfers" ("Orpheus in the Underworld"), identified with the once-popular can-can music hall dance. Offenbach's operatic work had itself parodied the classical tale of Orpheus' attempted rescue of Eurydice from Pluto (Hades). Gavin Bryars' music for Édouard Lock's full length ballet "Dido and Orfeo" (2011) reworks music from the operas "Dido and Aeneas" (Purcell) and "Orfeo ed Euridice" (Gluck) for a small ensemble of saxophone, viola, cello and piano. Orpheus
The Mask of Orpheus Orpheus must travel through is given a symbolic name. At the start of this act, time is moving backwards: Orpheus travels back out of and into the Underworld, and Euridice dies once more. Then time moves forwards as Orpheus leaves the Underworld again. One version of the Orpheus story is that he is then killed by a thunderbolt thrown by Zeus, while another is that he is dismembered by the women of Dionysus. Orpheus then becomes the subject of a cult and an oracle. Time flows backwards once more, and Orpheus' death is acted out again, and the opera ends