Caravaggio (film)

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Caravaggio
Directed by	Derek Jarman
Produced by	Sarah Radclyffe
Written by	Derek Jarman Suso Cecchi d'Amico Nicholas Ward-Jackson (story)
Starring	Nigel Terry Sean Bean Tilda Swinton
Music by	Simon Fisher-Turner
Cinematography	Gabriel Beristain
Editing by	George Akers
Distributed by	Cinevista (USA)
Release date(s)	August 29, 1986
Running time	93 min
Country	UK
Language	English
IMDb profile

Caravaggio (1986) is a British film directed by Derek Jarman. The film is a fictionalized re-telling of the life of Baroque painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio.

Jarman's film is involved with the love triangle of Caravaggio (Nigel Terry), Lena (Tilda Swinton) and Ranuccio (Sean Bean) and dwells upon Caravaggio's use of street people, drunks and prostitutes as models for his intense, usually religious paintings (see the article on the painter for examples). As with Caravaggio's own use of contemporary dress for his Biblical figures, Jarman depicts his Caravaggio in a bar lit with electric lights, or another character using an electronic calculator.

The film is notable for its texture and attention to detail, the intense performances and the idiosyncratic humor. By presenting Caravaggio as one of the founders of the chiaroscuro technique, it helped give expression to the legend that was beginning to form around him. Jarman's Caravaggio also suggests that his legend ultimately eclipsed his enormous talent.

Caravaggio was the first time that Jarman worked with Tilda Swinton and was her first film role. The film also features Sean Bean, Robbie Coltrane, Dexter Fletcher, Michael Gough and Nigel Davenport. The cook Jennifer Paterson was an extra. The production designer was Christopher Hobbs who was also responsible for the copies of Caravaggio paintings seen in the film.

[edit] External links

• Caravaggio at the Internet Movie Database

v • d • e Derek Jarman Feature Films Sebastiane (1976) • Jubilee (1977) • The Tempest (1979) • The Angelic Conversation (1985) • Caravaggio (1986) • Aria (segment "Depuis le Jour") (1987) • The Last of England (1988) • War Requiem (1989) • The Garden (1990) • Edward II (1991) • Wittgenstein (1993) • Blue (1993) Short film collages In the Shadow of the Sun (1981) • Glitterbug (1994)