The Burnt Orange Heresy

Based on the novel by Charles Willeford, this film from Italian director Giuseppe Capotondi boasts an eye-catching international cast. Danish actor Claes Bang (BBC's Dracula) is our shifty art-critic hero, who is lured to the Italian estate of a major art dealer (Mick Jagger, utterly unconvincing) and given a mission to secure a new work from a reclusive artist (Donald Sutherland) whose back catalogue was destroyed by fire. In tow is a younger woman (Elizabeth Debicki) with whom the protagonist is having a fling but who he knows very little about. Sutherland brings a mischievous glint to his performance, but the other characters lack credibility during innumerable smug, slightly gnomic conversations. If the execution can feel plodding, though, there's still intrigue in the story as it tantalises and teases, plus some gorgeous Italian vistas. It also asks some interesting questions about art, fame and criticism. Yet the film never achieves the kind of tension required to keep you hooked and, as events progress, it sheds its air of superiority to reveal itself as quite a schlocky thriller.