Historical drama
New in the cinema: child abduction in the name of the church
Enea Sala as the young Edgardo Mortara and Barbara Ronchi as his mother Marianna. photo
© Anna Camerlingo/Pandora Filmverleih/dpa
A film like a painting: In “The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope” Marco Bellocchio devotes himself to an outrageous chapter in the history of the Catholic Church.
It’s an outrageous story that Italian director Marco Bellocchio tells in his new drama. And it actually happened. In 1858, a six-year-old Jewish boy was kidnapped in Bologna on behalf of the Pope. The child was secretly baptized as an infant by his Catholic wet nurse. The church therefore has the irrefutable papal law that the boy must receive a Catholic education.
Against his and his family’s wishes, little Edgardo Mortara is taken to a boarding school in Rome and placed under the care of Pope Pius IX. raised to the Catholic faith. The case becomes a scandal – and Edgardo Mortara ultimately becomes a devout Catholic who becomes known as a preacher.
Competition film in Cannes
Marco Bellocchio has transformed the material into an artistic historical drama. “The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope” was screened in competition at the Cannes Film Festival this year. It is an opulent film that impresses with its harrowing story and magnificent visual design.
The scenes look like paintings, with strong light and shadow effects and in sepia tones. The audience sees extensive tracking shots over the piazza of Bologna or the roofs of Rome. “In terms of sets, costumes, colors and contrasts, we drew inspiration from the great tradition of pre-Impressionism in Italian and French painting, as expressed in the work of Eugène Delacroix,” Bellocchio, 84, said in an interview .
There is also an emotional story. The scenes with the young actor Enea Sala, who is taken away from his family and slowly finds a new caregiver in the Pope, are heartbreaking. The film also provides interesting historical insights into a time when child abduction in the name of the Pope was actually legal.
The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope, Italy/France/Germany 2023, 134 min., FSK for ages 12 and up, by Marco Bellocchio, with Enea Sala, Leonardo Maltese