Casanova

This sweeping, humourous, action-filled account of the famous lover is no classic, but it never slows down long enough to be boring. From Venice he travels to Russia, where he becomes involved with Catherine the Great, returning to Venice for a rousing finale. Better than average acting - although the characters are mostly fairly thin - and a wonderful visual style, with one long scene filmed in colour. If you aren't a fan of the silent era, this isn't for you, but if you're interested in cinema pre-sound, it's worth a look, especially in the immaculately restored version.

Ivan Mosjoukine is an odd specimen of early movie stardom. He can be handsome or grotesque, quirky or intense. Another reviewer described him as a combination of Buster Keaton and Bela Lugosi, and it's hard to come up with a better descriptor. Regardless, he was a major talent of the 1920s and his films are always worth seeking out.

CASANOVA might not be the most high brow of his oeuvre. It's a spectacle first and foremost, tossing its ne'er do-well hero from one amorous escapade to the next. Clocking at almost three hours, one might be tempted to think this souffle of a film overstays its welcome, but the action keeps moving so quickly and the visuals are so sumptuous that the time flies. Mosjoukine acquits himself well as the mischievous lady killer, coming off as both opportunistic and weirdly guileless in the elegant but dangerous world of 18th century Europe.

Flicker Alley recently put this one out on blu-ray and DVD, so if you're a silent film buff, I would definitely grab a copy while you can!

Ivan Mosjoukine pulled out all the stops to make the notorious rake look like a prototype James Bond. We've seen this in countless silent films already: historical and pseudo-historical figures such as Don Juan, Villon, any Doug Fairbanks movie. He's a superhero: irresistible lover, unbeatable swordsman (in both senses), daring spy, flashy gambler, unstoppable polymath, contortionist and escape artist, international man of mystery, debonair socialite, hero of the common people, and officially a wanted/outlawed desperado.

The weirdest thing is that that's exactly what Casanova was in real life, according to himself, but more or less substantiated by official documents and other persons' accounts. He was far, far more than merely the inveterate lover that his name has come to signify.

The film is spectacular, sensational, dazzling, a Baz Luhrmann extravaganza that even features stencil coloring (although pretty bad in some places: highlighting Casanova in red and white usually smears other characters in a bilious all-over green). The settings, including real Venetian and fake Russian exteriors, are fabulous; the interiors are sumptuous; the costumes and powdered wigs are superb (I'm happy to have finally discovered what makes farthingales stick out so absurdly on both sides).

Alexandre Volkoff directs magnificently. Mosjoukine is long in the tooth but full of commanding force. I struggled to keep the women distinct - those wigs and the clown-white makeup were an identity handicap for me - but they were all competent, while the main male supporting actors managed to stay just this side of farcical.

The legendary libertine comes to life in this mammoth, late silent French production, resurrected by the Cinemathéque François and restored to its original brilliance, complete with hand tinted costumes and fireworks in the climactic festival scenes. The panoramic location photography and lavish re-creation of decadent 18th century Venice make the film a visually spectacular, picaresque epic, following the title character through various chases, rescues, romantic liaisons, and hairbreadth escapes, spanning the continent from Italy to Russia and back again. With his athletic build and hypnotic gaze (the better to make women swoon) the celebrated lover is made to resemble, at least physically, an odd cross between Buster Keaton and Bela Lugosi's Dracula, but by the end of the film he is transformed from an indulgent ne'er-do-well into a charming and, at times, heroic scoundrel. Variations of the same story have been told many times since, but never with such energy or style.

'Casanova' shows Mosjoukine at his most light-hearted - like the great artist he was, he makes everything seem easy. This movie is episodic in structure, almost like a collection of short stories. Casanova bounces from one adventure to another, going from Venice to Austria to Russia and finally back to Venice again, and always in the service of women, as he puts it in a letter to a man he's good-naturedly robbed. In the end, all his romancing catches up with him, and he's forced to choose between two women - the scene where they both confront him reminds me a little of Moliere's Dom Juan, though Mosjoukine's Casanova is far more innocent. He delights in tricking and robbing men, especially the pompous and undeserving, but the moment he realizes that he has hurt a woman, his heart is crushed, and he surrenders to his enemies. Mosjoukine always demonstrates great sensitivity to women and I think this is at the root of his only unconvincing moment in the film. When he meets a young girl who is disguised as a boy, he's just too aware of her as a woman to be able to play the role of someone who's fooled into thinking that he's dealing with another man. But apart from this, Mosjoukine's performance is flawless. Rudolf Klein-Rogge, as the half-mad Czar Peter, is also brilliantly funny, marching around barking orders for his soldiers to recover from typhoid, and complaining that the business of state keeps distracting him from his fat, plain mistress. He also accomplishes the rare feat of upstaging Mosjoukine in their one scene together, when Casanova gives the Czar a manicure, and where they play off each other like a seasoned comedy team. Their by-play is so natural, and almost under the radar (the scene is mostly filmed in a kind of medium long shot, not at all focusing on them), it makes me think that they might have been ad-libbing. Klein-Rogge is obviously very comfortable playing comedy, and it would have been nice to see him do more in this vein. The music by Georges Delerue for the restoration of 'Casanova' is perfectly suited to the light-hearted freedom of the piece, and makes the whole experience a joy.