Tarot in the Movies--Reprise

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 23 Nov 2004, and now archived in the Forum Library.

Francesca	23 Nov 2004
I watched the Red Violin last night. The fortune teller (who's name is Cesca, short for Francesca, like me) uses a tarot deck that I didn't recognize. Does anyone know what deck she used? Francesca

Paul	23 Nov 2004
Francesca - I saw the movie, as well. My guess is that it is some prop-constructed hybrid of the following decks that share the same aesthetic because they are based on what are called the Carlo Della Rocco designs from 1835. BAckground info fails me now, but here's the deck titles: Ancient Italian Tarot - Lo Scarabeo Soprafino - Meneghello (@ http://www.tarotpassages.com/soprafin.htm Classic Tarot - Lo Scarabeo Tarocco Della Rocca (of course) - These come b&w with no color. Perhaps these were used and hand-colored. see http://www.spiritone.com/~filipas/Masquerade/Reviews/dellaroc.html & The Rider Waite, because I do recall that one card was Rider-Waite-ish. This was the first dead giveaway, because I knew that this was an incongruity to have these decks mixed. Also, I have most of these decks, but the Della Rocca, and the deck used by Cesca seemed larger than these; moreover, the backs of the deck were not back-designs I've seen. This is why I think the prop masters doctored their own deck, perhaps enlarging the images and pasting them on their own card stock. Francesca, if you like the aesthetic of the deck on Red Violin, you will likely appreciate the decks I mentioned above. Of course, to read these non-illustrated pip decks, you might appreciate the Marseille section of AT.

damfino	23 Nov 2004
Paul is right. The deck used used by Cesca was a specially designed Tarot for the film. I noticed that the five cards she draws are all Major Arcana, and the designs were very similar to those of the Marseilles Tarot, give or take a difference or two ("The Devil" has only one small figure instead of two, and "Justice" has a Chinese flag on the back).

The Tarot in the Movies--Reprise thread was originally posted on 23 Nov 2004 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.