Casanova

By Harry Forbes
Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) -- The story of history's most famous lover has had numerous screen impersonations from Bob Hope to Richard Chamberlain to Donald Sutherland, and now we have Australia's Heath Ledger.

This "Casanova" (Touchstone) is a handsome but leisurely paced 18th-century Venetian period piece about the ultimate ladies' man (Ledger), focusing on a previously untold (fictitious) love affair.

When the film opens, Casanova is an old man writing his memoirs, and recollecting his youth as a notorious rake, seducing women of every class, including a novice in a convent.

He fights a never-ending battle to escape the authorities: the dogged Dalfonso (Ken Stott) and the comically villainous Bishop Pucci (Jeremy Irons), who has branded him a heretic.

Casanova's friend and protector, the Doge (Tim McInnerny), informs him that unless the ne'er-do-well marries, he will be forced to exile him.

So Casanova proposes to Victoria (Natalie Dormer), whom he doesn't really love. But, on hearing this, young Giovanni Bruni (Charlie Cox) -- who's smitten with Victoria from afar -- boldly challenges Casanova to a duel.

At the appointed time, Casanova faces off against the young man's sister, Francesca (Sienna Miller), who takes her inept brother's place in the duel. Besides being a first-class swordswoman, she writes feminist tracts under a male nom de plume. (She has no idea that her sparring partner is Casanova, whose exploits she has read about and detests.)

Immediately taken with her, Casanova decides to impersonate Papprizzio (Oliver Platt), Francesca's fiance, whom she's never met. Francesca and her mother, Andrea (Lena Olin), completely fall for the ruse. Meanwhile, Casanova keeps the rotund Papprizzio at a distance by pretending to work with him on a program of self-improvement.

Francesca finds herself falling for the disguised Casanova, just as he begins to genuinely love her, for the first time in his life.

The stage is thus set for all kinds of comic misunderstandings, and confusions of identity, which help the film's pace, and lead to a dramatically satisfying conclusion.

The movie is a change of pace for Lasse Hallstrom (who directed this year's excellent Robert Redford film, "An Unfinished Life"). The Venice location shooting by cinematographer Oliver Stapleton is stunning, and there's a lush baroque soundtrack underscoring the action. There's a particularly lovely scene of Casanova and Francesca taking a ride in a hot air balloon over the city which, just taken on its own terms, is quite magical.

Overall, the performances are fine, with Ledger a convincingly athletic and romantic hero with a credible English accent, a far cry from his taciturn Wyoming cowboy in this year's "Brokeback Mountain." The script (by Jeffrey Hatcher and Kimberly Simi) is farcical without overdoing the slapstick.

But unfortunately, there's a surfeit of jibes at the Catholic Church (including Irons' bishop character). At one point, he promises a young woman he can restore both her reputation and her virginity. When she questions the veracity of that statement, he responds that of course he can do it: "We are the Catholic Church."

Or in answer to "Does the cardinal enjoy executions?" he retorts, "Does the pope have a balcony?" He defines heresy as "whatever I say it is."

There's also mention of a cardinal's mistress, and an episode involving seduction of a novice -- a familiar plot device, but another strike against the church in this context. Overall, the tone is lightly humorous throughout, not viciously anti-clerical.

Otherwise, the film is remarkably restrained in sexual matters, and even has a reasonably moral -- and certainly crowd-pleasing -- ending.

The film contains brief sexual episodes without nudity, innuendo, some crude expressions, pervasive anti-clerical view and a mild torture scene. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L -- limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R -- restricted.

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Forbes is director of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

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