Reviews

I've been on IMDb for over 10 years and I've never written a review before, but this time I was so disappointed with this film that I needed to write something. The Leopard is a film that's universally praised, even the great Martin Scorsese hails it as an essential piece, so I expected a solid masterpiece, but that wasn't the case here. I'm a big fan of Death in Venice and Rocco and His Brothers (both directed by Visconti), I usually enjoy long period films and I'm not really concerned when "nothing happens" in a film, but that's because when a film doesn't have a clear plot, it usually involves some serious character development or images that tell a story, even if it's not linear; unfortunately this film gets lost in itself, not really knowing what it wants to be, it's incredibly uneven, the political aspect that provides the context seems rather superficial even if the dialogue is mostly about politics and in the end it doesn't commit to anything, we get the main character who is the only one who seems like a real human being and not a one-dimensional statue, and Lancaster does a very good job with what he's given, but he becomes a spectator to the central couple that could not be more bland and uninteresting, they're supposed to be young and full of life but they seem to be uncapable of any real emotion (and Alain Delon is usually a great actor) and there's no way the audience could actually care about them. The production design, cinematography, costumes and music are indeed remarkable, I don't know how the book tells the story because I haven't read it, but even if it's a faithful adaptation, there should have been some sort of work in character development, pacing and finding a central line, because even in a film that's simply about "a few moments in the life of a family" there should be a theme that's fully explored, and yes, Don Fabrizio has an arc, seeing he's no longer relevant in the world but that would've worked if the people around him actually felt like real people. At last I'd also like to mention that the dubbing IS a problem, a lot of people say that it shouldn't take you out of the story but isn't a truly great film in the sound era supposed to have audio correctly synced? That's actually a problem for most (if not all) Italian films from the 60s (including La Dolce Vita, and 8 1/2) and I just can't ignore it because it is ultimately a flaw. So overall, I would never call this a terrible film or even a truly bad one, but I would say it is ineffective, flawed and definitely not a masterpiece.