Epic!
Saturday, August 23, 12:30 pm to 5:30 pm
Instructor: Maurizio Giammarco, Ph.D., Temple University
Based on the celebrated novel by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard (1963) is a landmark in Italian cinema. With operatic grandeur and impeccable Proustian attention to 19th-century period detail, it examines an aging Sicilian prince, Don Fabrizio Corbera (Burt Lancaster), caught in the turmoil of the Risorgimento (Italian unification). His calculating nephew (Alain Delon) fights alongside Garibaldi’s revolutionary army, though his allegiance will fluctuate as the national landscape changes. Both men are captivated by the beautiful Angelina (Claudia Cardinale), the daughter of a rich bourgeois who is suited to thrive in the new Italy. The film culminates in an extraordinary 45-minute ball sequence that brings together the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie, and the military, in which all the story’s themes converge.
The Leopard is one of the few films that is genuinely about history, depicting the folly, contradiction, and chaos of one class replacing another, and how a land of fiefdoms and nation-states unite into one country. Visconti’s masterpiece is a meditation on time, history, and the passing of a privileged class and its way of life.
Are you interested in “just” seeing this movie? Visit the public screening page here.
Cinema Classics Seminars offer an entertaining and engaging way to learn more about some of the true classics of world cinema. All students receive an introductory lecture before the film and a guided discussion after the film. In addition, those in attendance receive a ticket to see it on the big screen, as well as popcorn and a drink. Please note: the screening associated with this seminar will be open to the public, as well.
Please contact BMFI Programs and Education Manager Jill Malcolm with any questions.
$25 for members, $35 for non-members
Schedule