Boris Godunov (opera) to exhibit a lack of cohesion between scenes. He claimed that Mussorgsky was so deficient in the ability to write instrumental music that he dispensed with composing a prelude, and that he had "borrowed the cheap method of characterization by leitmotives from Wagner." Other composers were even more censorious. Pyotr Tchaikovsky wrote in a letter to his brother Modest: Of the critics who evaluated the new opera, only the 19-year-old critic Vladimir Baskin defended Mussorgsky's skill as a composer. Writing under the pen name "Foma Pizzicato", Baskin wrote, Although "Boris Godunov" is usually praised for its originality, dramatic choruses, sharply
The Ballad of Little Jo The Ballad of Little Jo The Ballad of Little Jo is a 1993 American western film inspired by the true story of a society woman who tries to escape the stigma of bearing a child out of wedlock by going out to the West, and living disguised as a man. The film stars Suzy Amis, Bo Hopkins, Ian McKellen, David Chung, Heather Graham, Carrie Snodgress and Melissa Leo, and was written and directed by Maggie Greenwald. Roger Ebert described the film as depicting a culture in which "men of poor breeding lived and worked together in desperate poverty of mind