“The return of Casanova” is the title of the latest film directed by Gabriele Salvatores and starring Toni Servillo, Fabrizio Bentivoglio and Sara Serraiocco. The protagonist, Leo Bernardi, is an established and acclaimed director at the end of his career, who has no intention of accepting his slow decline. For his latest work, Leo chooses to tell Arthur Schnitzler's Casanova, a character incredibly similar to him, more than he himself can imagine.
The return of Casanova
The one told by Schnitzler is a Casanova who has now passed his youth, the times of glory are gone. He no longer has his charm and his power over women, he no longer has a penny in his pocket, he no longer wants to travel around Europe. After years of exile, he has only one goal: to return to Venice, his home. On his journey home, Casanova meets a girl, Marcolina, which rekindles in him a hunger for conquest that he hadn't felt for years. In an attempt to seduce her, Casanova will come to the most tragic of conclusions: he has grown old. It is no coincidence that Leo Bernardi has decided to tell this story right now, at a crucial moment in his life and his career. The anxieties and doubts of the two are incredibly similar.
“It's a film I really care about – explained Gabriele Salvatores some time ago – because it's the first time I've talked a little about myself. The protagonist is a director a little younger than me who has to make a film about an elderly Casanova. The plot sees these two people facing a dilemma, in a complex phase of their lives. They wonder if one should always repeat one's character or indulge in something different”. In recent days the new film by Salvatores has successfully inaugurated, al Petruzzelli Theatre, the 14th edition of Bif&st (Bari International Film&Tv Festival).
