I saw Casanova today, and it’s the best romantic comedy I’ve seen since Shakespeare in Love. I don’t know why they don’t make more like these two movies; they’re both very Shakespearean with the ribald humor and mistaken identities. And in the end everything comes out okay, though it’s hard to see how, what with all the confusion of characters and their various funny intrigues. It’s just a plain good story, layered and fun, and it will probably not even do well at the box office because they haven’t been promoting it as much as they should. The trailers hardly show anything, and what little people see of it would probably turn them off because it’s a historical.

I hope the success of Brokeback Mountain, which is also very good (I highly recommend it!), will bring some audiences to Casanova. Heath Ledger‘s in both, and he’s an excellent actor fast gaining a lot of attention. I first saw him in 10 Things I Hate About You, and even then he was the sort of actor you could never forget; he’s got a presence and a real talent. When I saw him in The Four Feathers, I knew he’d do really well one day. That one didn’t do as well as it should have either, although it was worlds better than The Patriot.

Want to watch a really strangely anachronistic piece of historical romantic comedy starring Heath Ledger? Watch A Knight’s Tale. It opens at a knight’s tournament, the jousting event, and the crowd is chanting, “We will, we will rock you!” Like I said, anachronistic, but it’s also hellishly fun. Heck, here’s a memorable quote taken from the IMDB page:

Wat: Say something about her breasts.
Roland: Yeah, you miss her breasts.
William: Her breasts.
Chaucer: Ye… yes, you… you could, umm… umm… but I… I would tend to look above her breasts, William.
William: Well I… I miss her throat.
Chaucer: Uh, still higher really, toward the heavens.
Kate: The moon at least, her breasts were not that impressive.

Bit of trivia about the leading actress in A Knight’s Tale, the one who played Jocelyn: Shannyn Sossamon, who is Hawaiian (and part Filipina, thank you), was DJ-ing Gwyneth Paltrow‘s birthday party in Los Angeles when she was discovered. Because of this, I once suggested to my bosses where I used to work that we put her on one of our catalog covers. We sold DJ equipment, so every now and then we featured DJs on our covers, but we never had one that was also an actress; having her on the cover would have given our catalogs a much higher profile. Anyway, I used my connection outside of work (mainly H.E., since he knows everything) to get her agent’s contact information, and the agent actually seemed very open about the idea and soon expected a call from my bosses at work, but did they manage to call and get her on the cover? No. I no longer work there, so I feel safe in sharing that bit. [Hey, the company lost more than I did when they let me go.]

But I digress. Go watch Casanova, and bring a date. You’ll love it.

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