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IMDbPro

Caravaggio

  • 19861986
  • 1h 33m
IMDb RATING
6.5/10
6.3K
YOUR RATING
Dexter Fletcher in Caravaggio (1986)
A retelling of the life of the celebrated 17th-century painter through his brilliant, nearly blasphemous paintings and his flirtations with the underworld.
Play trailer1:42
1 Video
72 Photos
BiographyDramaHistory
A retelling of the life of the celebrated 17th-century painter through his brilliant, nearly blasphemous paintings and his flirtations with the underworld.A retelling of the life of the celebrated 17th-century painter through his brilliant, nearly blasphemous paintings and his flirtations with the underworld.A retelling of the life of the celebrated 17th-century painter through his brilliant, nearly blasphemous paintings and his flirtations with the underworld.
IMDb RATING
6.5/10
6.3K
YOUR RATING
    • Derek Jarman
    • Derek Jarman(screenplay)
    • Nicholas Ward Jackson(from an original idea by)
    • Suso Cecchi D'Amico(collaboration)
  • Stars
    • Noam Almaz
    • Dexter Fletcher
    • Nigel Terry
    • Derek Jarman
    • Derek Jarman(screenplay)
    • Nicholas Ward Jackson(from an original idea by)
    • Suso Cecchi D'Amico(collaboration)
  • Stars
    • Noam Almaz
    • Dexter Fletcher
    • Nigel Terry
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 34User reviews
    • 29Critic reviews
    • 55Metascore
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Awards

    Videos1

    Trailer
    Trailer 1:42
    Watch Trailer

    Photos72

    Dexter Fletcher in Caravaggio (1986)
    Tilda Swinton in Caravaggio (1986)
    Sean Bean, Tilda Swinton, and Nigel Terry in Caravaggio (1986)
    Sean Bean and Nigel Terry in Caravaggio (1986)
    Sean Bean and Nigel Terry in Caravaggio (1986)
    Caravaggio (1986)
    Dexter Fletcher in Caravaggio (1986)
    Nigel Terry in Caravaggio (1986)
    Spencer Leigh and Nigel Terry in Caravaggio (1986)
    Nigel Terry in Caravaggio (1986)
    Caravaggio (1986)
    Dexter Fletcher in Caravaggio (1986)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Noam Almaz
    • Boy Caravaggio
    Dexter Fletcher
    Dexter Fletcher
    • Young Caravaggio
    Nigel Terry
    Nigel Terry
    • Caravaggio
    Sean Bean
    Sean Bean
    • Ranuccio
    Garry Cooper
    Garry Cooper
    • Davide
    Spencer Leigh
    • Jerusaleme
    Tilda Swinton
    Tilda Swinton
    • Lena
    Nigel Davenport
    Nigel Davenport
    • Giustiniani
    Robbie Coltrane
    Robbie Coltrane
    • Scipione Borghese
    Michael Gough
    Michael Gough
    • Cardinal Del Monte
    Dawn Archibald
    • Pipo
    Jack Birkett
    • The Pope
    Una Brandon-Jones
    • Weeping Woman
    Imogen Claire
    • Lady with the Jewels
    Sadie Corre
    • Princess Collona
    Lol Coxhill
    • Old Priest
    Vernon Dobtcheff
    Vernon Dobtcheff
    • Art Lover
    Terry Downes
    Terry Downes
    • Bodyguard
      • Derek Jarman
      • Derek Jarman(screenplay)
      • Nicholas Ward Jackson(from an original idea by)
      • Suso Cecchi D'Amico(collaboration) (uncredited)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      Tilda Swinton's debut.
    • Goofs
      A typewriter is used, a saxophone is played, a train and steamship hooter are heard. In addition one of the characters plays with a (very advanced for the time of the movie) credit card-sized calculator with beeping buttons. These items are included deliberately as a stylistic decision of the filmmakers, not "goofs" of people unaware of the absence of these items in the 1500s and 1600s.
    • Quotes

      Caravaggio: [after being stabbed by Ranuccio Caravaggio touches the wound and blood] Blood brothers!

      [Ranucchio kisses him]

    • Crazy credits
      The end credits scroll down the screen (top-to-bottom).
    • Connections
      Featured in Arena: Derek Jarman - A Portrait (1991)
    • Soundtracks
      MISSA LUX ET ORGIO
      By kind permission of Casa Musicale Eco (Milan)

    User reviews34

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    4/10
    Beautiful to look at, but lacking a third dimension
    What we know of Caravaggio suggests a strutting brawler with a healthy sense of entitlement who lived amongst whores and thieves and hustlers and put them on canvas. His works' themes were sex, death, redemption, above all, finding the sacred within the profane. He lived at a time where homosexuality carried a death sentence and political intrigue normally involved fatalities in a society defined by the maxim "strangling the boy for the purity of his scream".

    You can't fault Derek Jarman for his cinematography, nor his recreations of Caravaggio's paintings and you certainly can't accuse the man of shying away from the homosexuality. But frankly, Jarman never strays beyond 80s caricature. Italian patronage becomes the 80s London art scene complete with pretty waiters and calculators. Sean Bean is a sexy bit of Northern rough oiling his motorbike. Tilda Swinton performs a transformation worthy of a Mills and Boons ("Why, Miss Lena, without that gypsy headscarf, you're beautiful..."). Jarman provides Caravaggio with a particularly trite motive for the murder which left him exiled.

    This could have been a visually stunning treatment of a man whose life was dangerous, exciting, violent and decadent but who nonetheless elevated the lives of ordinary people to the status of Renaissance masterpieces, looked on by Emperors and Kings. Instead, what you get is Pierre et Gilles do Italy. The pretty bodies of young boys are shown to perfection, but never the men who inhabit them. Jarman appears to satirise the London art scene, showing it shallow and pretentious. To use Caravaggio and Renaissance Italy to make the point is to use a silk purse to make a pig's ear. In fairness, this film remains visually stunning, but ultimately as two dimensional as the paintings it describes.
    helpful•38
    7
    • kingsinead
    • Feb 23, 2008

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • August 29, 1986 (United States)
      • United Kingdom
      • Zeitgeist Films
      • English
      • Italian
    • Also known as
      • Limehouse Studios, Limehouse, London, England, UK
    • Production companies
      • British Film Institute (BFI)
      • Channel Four Television
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

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    • 1 hour 33 minutes
      • Mono

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