Director Luchino Visconti’s (Rocco and his Brothers, The Leopard) final film, released two months after his death, is a stunning conclusion to an epic career, a sumptuous adaptation of Gabriele d’Annunzio’s 1892 novel portraying the decadence of the aristocracy in late 19th-century Italy. An atheistic aristocrat (Giancarlo Giannin) carries on an open affair with the manipulative Jennifer Oneill; but when his wife falls pregnant to a rival his world soon collapses around him. “Visconti’s last great film…a masterly study of love, betrayal and class decadence.” The Evening Standard.
