“Caravaggio” is a 1986 British historical drama film directed by openly gay filmmaker Derek Jarman (“Sebastiane”, “The Angelic Conversation”, “Edward II”), who died of AIDS in 1994. The film is a fictionalised retelling of the life of Baroque painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio.
I first saw this film around 2005, I think? I only saw it the one time; a rental from the Hollywood Video where I worked. I never owned it, but it was a film that I had always wanted to see and I had great affection for “Edward II”, which had shocked and then haunted me for years. I have always intended to revisit “Caravaggio” and now, I have. There were many things in the film which I had forgotten, like the inclusion of modern elements, similar to “Edward II”, and aside from Sean Bean and Tilda Swinton, the world famous cast, including Michael Gough and Robbie Coltrane (“Mona Lisa”, “The Fruit Machine”). Indeed, the bits I most remembered was a sort of 3 way love affair between Nigel Terry’s Caravaggio, Sean Bean’s Ranuccio & Tilda Swinton’s Lena – though these memories were both vague and powerful. I had totally forgotten the essential murders of the plot or Spencer Leigh’s heartbreaking Jerusaleme.
But is it any good? Yes, I think it is. Probably more so if one was alive when it was released and knows what it must have taken to make this film, which seems like a brilliant and noble act of bravery to me. But that’s the thing: I admire the filmmaker so much that I find it difficult to judge his work. Watch it for yourself and you tell me.