The Leopard (1963) - Luchino Visconti
-A mosaic of sensations:
The perception of decadence and the attempt to maintain power in the face of inevitable change is at the heart at first. Tancredi (Alain Delon), nephew of Don Fabrizio, the prince of Salina, becomes a revolutionary as soon as the Garibaldian Revolution lands in Sicily, - interesting to realize that the hero of the story, the main character, is not the active agent, but the nephew - not as an enthusiast, a dreamer, his intentions are clear: "if we want everything to remain as it is, everything must change", a phrase he utters to his uncle. It is evident from the opening built by Visconti - we see family members gathered in a room praying in terror of the revolution that germinated outside - that the aristocracy feared the loss of powers. For this not to happen everything needed to change, and to remain as before. The construction of the scene in question establishes a very rich imaginary capacity to conduct the feelings. The use of the plane where only the frightened aristocrats are shown excludes any external element from the image, but introduces them through the sound.
""On the "outside" the shots are heard, the presence is absent in the eyes, but perceptible to the frightened dominant agents in disbelief at their imminent disappearance as a class."" [P. Leão]
As brazilian critic S. Pendre said: ""Visconti is the other side of Prince Salinas's coin. Son of an aristocrat with a bourgeois, Visconti has one side in the toga, another in the mundane. Fabrizio, the prince lived by Burt Lancaster, is the nobleman who goes to a brothel, is the man who does not believe and does not trust the bourgeoisie, but supports the revolution promoted by them. ""
He knows that Sicily is a land of conservatives, of a people who do not accept changes. In the long dialogue with the emissary of the government of Turin and the refusal to a vacancy in the Senate, the explanation: the view is wonderful precisely because the access roads are bad. One thing is derived from the other. The compliment of the rustic, of the Sicilian soul, is what makes Fabrizio. Nothing further from Visconti, aristocrat of the north, but at the same time, nothing closer, in spirit. "
In "The Leopard" the opera style merges with realism, and there is still room for melodrama. In my favorite scene, the prince of Salinas is hiding from the crowds of the ball, there he faces a painting that represents death, so he starts to wonder about his own death. It's like a mirror for his own decay.
Eleven years before, in 1952, at some point in "Bellissima" Maddalena Cecconi (Anna Magnani) says: "
This is Burt Lancaster, he has such a nice voice, he looks sympathetic", or something like that. Now, he's working with Visconti, I read quite a lot of complaints about Lancaster's dubbed voice, honestly I couldn't care less. His strong presence and beautiful performance transcends the absence of his own voice.
The third time I saw, I often paused the film to enjoy the image that looked more like a painting, like Barry Lyndon. Even the 'war scenario' is operatic and well filmed. Just as in Senso, where Visconti cuts to war as soon as we see Livia betray her country (as a way of showing us everything she turned her back on), in Leopard War is an essential part of the process. The melancholy, the decay of the aristocracy, the acting, the sceneries, the camera movements, Visconti directing... A masterpiece.
★★★★★
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