Casanova

There was Fellini’s Casanova, starring Donald Sutherland. There was Casanova’s Big Night, starring Bob Hope. There were and have been many others, one of which is the recent Casanova, starring Heath Ledger and Sienna Miller. This one is dumb but entertaining and often funny.

The film credits say that Casanova was filmed on location in Venice, and there are numerous shots of the city up close and from a distance. But there is much digital enhancement in evidence, and it is often difficult to tell the real from the illusion. That is the nature of Venice, a city that would have died 400 years ago were it not for tourists. Venice today is as convincing as Frontierland, but more visually compelling. Much of the film appears to have been shot on set, though perhaps the set was in Venice.

Heath Ledger, who plays the title character, was the stunningly inarticulate Ennis Del Mar in Brokeback Mountain. Here he has a quite different part and is almost unrecognizable as the actor who played Ennis. He does a good job here, but the part was probably not much of a challenge.

My favorite character is the pope’s inquisitor, Pucci, played by Jeremy Irons. He is impressively ominous and dimwitted.

Also effective was Casanova’s sidekick, Lupo, played by Omid Djalili, who was the doorman Nassim in the short-lived Whoopie television series. Oliver Platt plays the role of Paprizzio, a hog fat dealer. At first he seems simply a big, narcissistic hog fat dealer (you know the type), but his part gradually develops in a comic and surprising way.

This film may entertain and amuse, but if you nap here and there you won’t miss much.