(aka 'Casanova' or 'Fellini's Casanova')
Italy /
USA 1976
Fellini recounts episodes
from the life of Italy's greatest lover in his grandiose rendering of the
memoirs of Casanova
According to Donald Sutherland, who embodies the eponymous 17th-century love
machine in Fellini's Casanova, the celebrated Italian director was inspired to
make the movie partly in response to a gruesome news story of the day: two Roman
rich kids murdered a woman and while on their way to dispose of the body,
stopped off at a friend's party to whoop it up.
The world of Casanova, peopled with Fellini's favored cast of degenerates,
freaks and idiot crowds is a stylized transposition of this decadent
contemporary landscape. The blasé, nouveau riche European sensibility which
Fellini exposed a decade or so earlier with
La Dolce Vita (1960) is distilled once more in the morally void Casanova
and the grotesquery of his artificial surroundings.
Fellini's approach is to unravel the myth of the great libertine and rewrite him
as not merely depraved - this much is known - but as a romantic failure and a
bankrupt cultural icon. This he does through the force of his imagination rather
than through the strength of his storytelling. There is little narrative
coherence to the film. As with many Fellini pictures, the director resorts to a
succession of extended tableaux to portray episodes in Casanova's life - drawn
from Fellini's somewhat disdainful interpretation of the memoirs of the man
himself. Thus, the great lover lurches from one picaresque encounter to the next
- in Rome, London, Dresden and so on - without ever leaving the Cinecittà back
lot, and with only the slimmest chronology.
Excerpt from Channel 4 located HERE .
Posters
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Theatrical Release: December 7th, 1976
Reviews More Reviews DVD Reviews
DVD Review: Fremantle Home Entertainment (2-disc) - Region 0 - PAL
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| Distribution | Fremantle Home Entertainment - Region 0 - PAL | |
| Runtime | 2:27:45 | |
| Video | 1.73:1
Aspect Ratio Average Bitrate: 7.6 mb/s PAL 720x576 25.00 f/s |
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NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes. |
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| Audio | English (Dolby Digital 2.0), Italian (Dolby Digital 2.0) , French (Dolby Digital 2.0) | |
| Subtitles | English, None | |
| Features |
Release Information:
Edition Details: • Featurette:
Casanova, Fellini and Me (53:24) |
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| Comments: |
The image quality looks quite good - a shade flat in parts - but the colors are exceptional. There is very minor debris in the form of speckles. My suspicions are that the original ratio is 1.66 and at around 1.72 this looks as though it may be stretched vertically a slight amount. Regardless, I am very happy with the image - it looks very good - lots of grain on the anamorphic, progressive transfer. It is not perfect, but I am satisfied at this point. Audio has options for English, Italian and French, with all choices being utilized in original production. I listened to it in Italian leaving Sutherland's wonderful voice dubbed. The 2.0 channel tracks were acceptable if not stellar. The 2nd disc of extras contains two informative featurettes that are highly interesting for Fellini fans. Input comes from Sutherland, Anthony Quinn and many who worked with or knew Fellini. I enjoyed both very much. I am very content with this package and we recommend it as the best option for viewing the film (I understand there is a French DVD out but that this bests it). The style is pure Fellini and it makes for an intriguing viewing. |
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Disc 2
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Subtitle Sample
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Screen Captures
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Recommended Books on Federico Fellini (CLICK COVERS or TITLES for more information)
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Federico Fellini by Christopher Wiegand |
Fellini on Fellini by Federico Fellini, Isabel Quigley |
The Cinema of Federico Fellini by Peter Bondanella |
The Films of Federico Fellini (Cambridge
Film Classics) by Peter Bondanella, Ray Carney |
I'm a Born Liar: A Fellini Lexicon by Damian Pettigrew |
Fellini by Lietta Tornabuoni |
Fellini: A Life by Hollis Alpert |
I, Fellini by Charlotte Chandler, Billy Wilder |
| DVD Box Cover |
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CLICK to order from:
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| Distribution | Fremantle Home Entertainment - Region 0 - PAL | |
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