Keswick Film Festival

Synopsis

"The best film ever made", said one of our members firmly 5 years ago. We've waited for this new, pristine example of the BFI's restoration programme to see if she was right. Certainly a classic: Prince Salina (Lancaster as the Leopard, so-called for his power and eminence) must come to terms with rapid change in 1860s Italy as Garibaldi's revolutionary army invades his Sicilian fiefdom. To protect his patrician status, he wants his bolshie nephew, Tancredi (Delon), to marry Angela (Cardinale), beautiful daughter of a rich merchant: the scene is set for a superb, sumptuous epic as marxist aristocrat Visconti illuminates Lampedusa's wonderful novel.

Grand Prix, Cannes Film Festival 1963