The Leopard, Netflix review: an unashamedly glossy take on a classic novel
In the run-up to its launch, The Leopard has already garnered the sort of opprobrium reserved for much-loved great books that a haughty literati think can only be cheapened by thicko television. This, it hardly needs to be said, is almost always the opprobrium of the haven't-actually-watched-it.
Having actually watched The Leopard, the first thing to be said about it is that in television, money talks. Netflix is reported to have spent around £40 million on making 19th-century Sicily look TripAdvisor-ready, and, my, does it show. You barely need to get involved in the political stirrings of Garibaldi's nascent revolution and its effect on the legacy and stability of the Prince of Salina and his family, to enjoy the backdrops. I try to steer clear of epithets involving the words sumptuous or lavish, but The Leopard is just ludicrously luxe. You can imagine it being played simultaneously on every screen in Currys as they show off the stunningly deep blacks in the latest range of Samsung OLEDs.
That, of course, is not enough. You need more than fancy wallpaper to get you through six hours of drama, and in this regard The Leopard will divide. It is deliberately – sometimes infuriatingly – old school in its story-telling, happy to rinse out the melodrama where required like a chocolate box Western. The story is a familiar one from 19 th century Europe: the old regime of hereditary landowners living out the last vestiges of feudalism in obstinate luxury must face up to the industrial future. In the case of Il Gattopardo, that means the transfer of power in sunny Sicily from the old Bourbon aristocracy to the new Kingdom of Italy. Heretics, apostates and cutthroats – aka the unscrupulous liberal bourgeoisie – are coming to overthrow the conservative order.
You don't have to be a geopolitical buff to note the parallels with current events, but to its credit The Leopard never lectures. Instead, the balance for director Tom Shankland (The Serpent) to strike is one between landscape and character. This is unashamedly a saga of the North and South or indeed the Foryste school. It is gunning for big scenes played against big backdrops amongst big families. At times it overreaches, with just too much ominous music presaging harsh times, too many candles and too much hat doffing, too many bells (literally) tolling. Visuals so sumptuous they make Downton Abbey look like Alan Clarke are wonderful, but they also contribute to a sense of TV trying to justify its budget. Relentless epic-ness can be like eating too many desserts.
Against this, The Leopard finds subtlety in performance. Italy's Kim Rossi Stuart (Romanzo Criminale) takes the lead as the Prince of Salina and he has plainly been watching The Sopranos, because his 'principe' is a classic modern, male TV anti-hero. Caught between love for his nephew Tancredi – who is siding against the family with the revolution – and the need to push back against what he knows is the inevitable march of history, the prince's battle, which is the crux of the series, is mostly with himself. It is this that makes The Leopard a modern tale, in spite of all its lavish, sumptuous classical framing.
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