Casanova Review
By Philippa Hawker
February 14, 2006



New story of the legendary lover is a good-natured, easy-going confection.
Heath Ledger as Casanova: a young, energetic hedonist.

Fellini's 1976 Casanova imagined the great seducer as a dark, debilitated figure - not the kind of movie you'd select for a Valentine's Day opening. But Lasse Hallstrom's version, starring Heath Ledger, which arrives in cinemas today, is an ideal film for the annual celebration of hearts, flowers and public demonstrations of devotion: it's not the tale of a heartless libertine, but of a guy who just hasn't found the right girl yet.

Ledger's Casanova is a young, energetic hedonist who enjoys the protection of Venice's Doge (Tim McInnerny). But the church wants to crack down on his activities: he's told by his patron that he has to find a virtuous wife, or protection can no longer be assured. So Casanova selects a virginal bride, and prepares to wed.

Meanwhile a feisty young woman, Francesca (Sienna Miller) is staging her own form of sexual revolution, dressing up in male attire to argue for women's rights: she's a feminist who also happens to believe in true love. Yet she is about to be married off to a wealthy Genoese lard merchant to save the family fortunes.

From these twin examples of matrimonial compulsion, the film cheerfully expands into a story of duels, disguises, double lives and deceptions, of brisk swordplay, bons mots, balloon rides and Venetian locations.

Ledger plays Casanova with suitably dashing yet offhand ardour, as a seducer-turned-romantic, while Jeremy Irons, as the Inquisition's sinister Bishop Pucci, swishes around in purple robes and a ginger wig, and seems to be channelling Edith Evans as Lady Bracknell.

The film could easily settle for being a heavy-handed Carry on Casanova romp, or it could strain for underlying seriousness and quality period-piece credentials. Instead, it's a good-natured, easy-going confection - and although it shares some of the same themes as Hallstrom's tedious Chocolat (for the freedom of the individual, against institutional repression) it has a much lighter touch.


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Genre: Comedy, Romance, Drama
Run Time: 111 mintues
Rated: M
Country: United States
Director: Lasse Hallstrom
Actors: Heath Ledger, Sienna Miller, Jeremy Irons, Oliver Platt

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