Fellini's Casanova Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

Fellini's Casanova Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov December 22, 2020

"Fellini's Casanova" (1976) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the disc include vintage trailer and new audio commentary by critic Nick Pinkerton. In English or Italian, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".

Federico Fellini's Casanova is a dark, at times notably disturbing film. It chronicles the deeds of the famous Italian seducer after he is captured and thrown in prison on accusations of heresy and witchcraft. In 1977, the film won Oscar Award for Best Costume Design, as well as David Award for Best Music at the David di Donatello Awards (the Italian Academy Awards).

The film opens up with Giacomo Casanova's (Donald Sutherland) arrest -- he has been sentenced by the almighty Inquisition. A confident, borderline arrogant man is escorted to a gloomy cell. He is slowly stripped of his clothes and locked up. As the prison guard walks away, Casanova begs to be freed but his plea is rejected.

Eventually, Casanova manages to escape the prison. He begins wandering Europe's most exciting cities where he encounters a number of fascinating characters. He seduces Angelina the Giantess (played by Sandra Elaine Allen, once the world's tallest woman), Rosalba the Mechanical doll (Leda Lojodice), the famous Dr. Moebius's (Mario Cencelli) daughters (Olimpia Carlisi and Silvana Fusacchia), and the old but lustful Marquise d'Urfe (Cicely Browne). Casanova even beds a nun when he secretly visits the great city of Venice. At one point, he also crosses paths with the legendary Don Juan. The film ends on a deceivingly upbeat note with a very interesting message.

Fellini's Casanova is a film critics love to argue about. Some have claimed that it is a despicably exploitative work in which excess and human degradation are used for no other reason but to scandalize; others have defended it as an impressive dark satire on the fallacies of human nature.

What Fellini attempted to accomplish with Casanova, however, is perhaps a bit of both. As expected, his imagination runs wild and, occasionally, the film entertains themes that are simply impossible to fully rationalize. But do they have to be? After all, Fellini’s films aestheticized perversity and art by merging them together and promoting them as a form of culture that does not need to be defined by conventional logic.

What makes the film so fascinating to behold is precisely the fact that it is impossible to decode its message. Fellini constantly plays with one’s expectations and in the process carefully blurs the fine line that separates the logical from the illogical. So the sooner one realizes it, the easier it becomes to appreciate his vision. (The basic idea behind Fellini Satyricon is the same, though everything, from the narrative to the visuals, is moved to an entirely different level).

The cast is fantastic. Sutherland delivers a career-defining performance as Casanova. The numerous unprofessional actors are also impressive. The little known at the time Lojodice, for example, who plays the lusty mechanical doll, is incredible.

Fellini and Giuseppe Rotunno shot the entire film inside Cinecitta studios in Rome. More than 200 technicians assisted multiple Oscar-winning production designer Danilo Donati (Salo, or The 120 Days of Sodom, Caligula).

Fellini's Casanova Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Fellini's Casanova arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber.

The release is sourced from a brand new 4K master that was prepared after the film was restored in 4K. During the restoration work, the original camera negative was accessed. The new 4K master is really good, but I found the technical presentation quite frustrating. Here's why:

The encoding on this release is quite shaky and as a result there are some pretty obvious anomalies that affect negatively the quality of the presentation. The most problematic areas are the darker sequences where the grain is very heavy, but you should keep in mind that the entire film is actually quite dark. In these areas the grain becomes mushy and even smeary, causing existing fine nuances to collapse. On my system, I could observe how every other frame had smeary grain, and I assume that other people with larger screens will notice the effect as well. This issue also impacts fluidity, so when the camera moves at times it looks like there is motion-judder. (This is the best way I can explain what I see). Very tight and properly exposed grain ensures completely different fluidity. Now, I pulled up Carlotta Films' very old release of Fellini's Casanova which we reviewed in 2009 here and on it there are some encoding anomalies as well. The difference is, the previous presentation -- which actually still looks really good even next to the 4K master -- does not have the high-quality grain the 4K master has produced, so it hides these anomalies quite well. On this release the encoding anomalies are exacerbated quite dramatically because the source reveals superior information, so you see more of the good and the bad. In other words, with proper encoding optimizations the current presentation would have been very different and ultimately vastly more satisfying. The rest looks great. The color scheme is very similar to the old one from the French release, but it reveals some richer nuances. My guess is that if seen in native 4K the 4K master would produce even better and more impressive nuances. (It was quite easy for me to tell that some of the darker nuances, for instance, cannot be handled very well in 1080p, so some are merged, which is why it can look like there is crushing). Image stability is excellent. All in all, I think that on smaller screens most viewers will probably be pleased with the current presentation of Fellini's Casanova, but larger screens and especially projectors make the anomalies that are highlighted above impossible to ignore. My score is 3.75/5.00. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

Fellini's Casanova Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There are two standard audio tracks on this Blu-ray release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 and Italian DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature.

I viewed the entire film with the English track. I'd say that it sounds a little bit fuller and sharper than the previous English track from the French release from Carlotta Films. I don't think that it is cleaner because I don't recall any issues with the previous track. Some light unevenness from the overdubbing remains, but this is fine because it is part of the original soundtrack for the film.

Fellini's Casanova Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer - vintage trailer for Fellini's Casanova. In English, not subtitled. (3 min, 1080p).

• Audio Commentary - critic Nick Pinkerton discusses in great detail the production of Fellini's Casanova, the visuals style of the film (with some very good comments about the overlapping of the real and surreal), Fellini's career, etc.

• Booklet - 10-page illustrated booklet featuring Alberto Zambenedetti's essay "Fellini's Cinematic Music Box" as well as technical credits.

Fellini's Casanova Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The new 4K restoration of Fellini's Casanova is very nice. However, its technical presentation on this release is quite frustrating. I also have to mention that a lot more could have been done in terms of supplemental features because Fellini's Casanova is just one of those great classic exotic films that are so fascinating to deconstruct. Ultimately, what is on this release is clearly the best presentation of the film, but I think that an opportunity was missed to deliver a deserving definitive edition of it. RECOMMENDED, but wait for the right price to emerge.