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The story takes place in Sicily during the 1860s and depicts the decline of the aristocracy in light of the changing social and political order during Italy's struggle for unification. Visconti's attention to period detail is nothing short of astounding, and his painterly compositions are truly inspired, and never intrude on the narrative.

Burt Lancaster gives his finest, most noble performance as Prince Don Fabrizio of Salina, and Alain Delon is charming as his nephew, Tancredi, whose character represents the transition from the old order to the new. Tancredi's marriage to Angelica (Claudia Cardinale) unites his aristocratic blood with that of the emerging bourgeoisie and thereby closes the gap between the classes. The insightful Don Fabrizio sums up the central point of the story: "If we want everything to remain as it is, it will be necessary for everything to change."

A restored special edition of this truly remarkable film is scheduled for release in 2004 by Criterion Collection as a three disc set including both the Italian and American release. The Leopard will finally get the DVD treatment it truly deserves.

Copy and paste the following link to view the details of the Criterion DVD: http://www.criterionco.com/asp/release.asp?id=235§ion=synopsis

Epic filmmaking at its finest
Adapted from a novella by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard paints a vivid picture of the Italian aristocracy falling from grace and the middle class revolting to form a more democratic Italy on an epic canvas. Caught up in this class revolution is an affluent family led by the Prince of Salina, Don Fabrizio Corbera (Burt Lancaster). He recognizes that he is part of an obsolete generation and that his young nephew, Tancredi Falconeri (Alain Delon), and his beautiful fiancée, Angelica Sedara (Claudia Cardinale), represent the new order.

The first DVD features an audio commentary by film scholar Peter Cowie. He provides the backstory to Visconti's career leading up to The Leopard. Cowie talks at length about the film in relation to its source material. This is a strong, informative track that is an excellent introduction to the cinema of Visconti.

The second DVD starts off with a fantastic, hour-long documentary, entitled "A Dying Breed: The Making of the Leopard," that was created especially for the DVD. There are interviews with most of the surviving cast and crew, including Claudia Cardinale and the film's screenwriters.

This is an excellent look at The Leopard from the origins of the novel to the film's botched U.S. version that truncated Visconti's vision and was re-dubbed with English-speaking actors.

There is also a "Goffredo Lombardo Interview" with the producer of The Leopard.

"The History of Risorgimento" examines the real historical figures and the times they lived in with the professor of Italian Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, Millicent Marcus. This is a really good primer for anyone who is unfamiliar with this particular period of Italian history.

Finally, there is a "Promotional Materials" section with an extensive stills gallery, a vintage Italian newsreel of the film's premiere and its success at that year's Cannes Film Festival, and three trailers-one Italian and two American.

The third and final DVD features a remastered copy of the truncated U.S. version that was dubbed in English and included Lancaster's actual voice.

Criterion has pulled off quite a coup with this DVD set. This is the first time that The Leopard has ever appeared on DVD. Criterion has painstakingly restored the film to its original glory, with a flawless transfer and included both the Italian and U.S. versions. It is a fitting package for this cinematic masterpiece.

History as told by an Arsitocrat
This is a film about the end of an age -- the age of the aristocrat. It also happens to be a film made by a member of the aristocracy. Luchino Visconti, the director, comes from a long line of Italian aristocrats. Visconti's films are all in one way or another about men who are incompatible with the age in which they live. In The Leopard Lancaster plays a refined Prince who has outlived his time. In his prime the Prince was the very model of health and vitality and he was the uncontested authority to all who lived in his province but now he is starting to show his age and his own decline coincides with the decline of his class and an entire way of life. Being such a refined figure the Prince records his decline in minute detail -- he seems to age right before our very eyes. It is obvious to the filmgoer that Visconti has no real love for democracy nor the way of life that comes with it. Elections are seen as crass popularity contests and the parvenus who seek office are seen as dim and uncultivated and lacking in that fineness of spirit that was the defining trait of the aristocracy. It is the Princes misfortune to live to see all that he values vanishing minute by minute before his very eyes and that is what happens in the famous hour-long ballroom scene. The new class rising to power has no time to cultivate that fineness of spirit and range of interest required to understand men and their needs and so govern them well. Instead the class now rising to power is largely self-serving and small-minded. Though they call themselves democrats they are preoccupied with material gain and status and the kind of civilization they are making is no longer capable of producing a man like the Prince. However Visconti himself is proof that the aristocratic spirit lives on even though the aristocracy does not.

It is more than a bit likely that this portrait of an ideal aristocat is just that, an ideal. I've heard this film described as Proustian. That is true only in so much as the film is obsessed with the passage of time. Proust, unlike Visconti, is interested in a multi-faceted psychological expose of the leisurely class. Proust loves his aristocrats but he shows them for the vain creatures that they are. Proust may have had something of the romantic in him but that was balanced by a keen social awareness (ie Dreyfus affair) that is nowhere to be found in Visconti's single-minded meditation on one man's point of view. Proust can speak of highly subjective states of mind and points of view but each point of view is balanced by other points of view. This pluralism and balance is simply not to be found in the Leopard nor in any of Visconti's other works. The Leopard is Visconti's best film but it is a myopic world view we are getting - we feel trapped in the Princes(and by extension the aristocratic) point of view. This is at times a strength and at times a weakness of the film.