'Il Ritorno D'Ulisse in Patria' is somewhat in the shadow of 'L'Orfeo' and especially 'L'Incoronazione Di Poppea' as far as Monteverdi operas go, but is actually every bit as great an opera as them.Monteverdi's music is gorgeous, with a masterful connection to the poetry and text and making the characters as human and empathetic as possible, while the opera's story is intense, passionately youthful, poignant and wise, not as static as some early music operas are.
This 1985 video from the Salzburg Festival presents the 1641 opera by Monteverdi in an updating by the contemporary German composer, Hans Werner Henze, and this has proved to be a very controversial production.For one thing, some kind of reconstruction is necessary since the early manuscripts are little more than a melody line and figured bass and any orchestration is non-existent as far as I know.
My personal favourite of the Ponnelle-Harnencourt-Monteverdi trilogy was L'Orfeo for its symbolism and visual opulence. L'Incoronazione was also very good, but this Il Ritorno D'Ulisse in Patria ranks very close to L'Orfeo.
While not my most ideal production of Il Rittorno D'Ulisse(the 1980 and 1985 performances, and I was deeply moved also by the Luxon-Baker performance), this production is still impressive regardless. I did find the costumes rather drab, even in the case of Neptune, but loved the impressionist backdrops and sets finding them very evocative.
I found this production not only great but very interesting, mainly because contemporary composer Hans Werner Henze adapts Monteverdi's music here. Despite my reservations, I think he does prove to be a good match.
