With The Kidnapping (Rapito in the original Italian version), in competition at Cannes in 2023, Italian director Marco Bellocchio looks at a true story, the “Mortara affair”, which shook Italy in the 19th century: the kidnapping of a 6-year-old Jewish child in Bologna on June 24, 1858, by order of the authority of Pius IX. Edgardo Mortara will be educated in a strict Catholic boarding school in Rome, before converting to his new religion and becoming a priest. He remained faithful to the papacy throughout his life, even after the fall of the Papal States and the unification of Italy.

Here we find the great aesthetic mastery and baroque style of the director of Le Diable au corps. The Abduction is a rich and powerful film directed by a maestro of Italian cinema. With chiaroscuro images that blend with others where the light shines brightly (let’s highlight the beautiful photo direction of Francesco Di Giacomo); operatic music which accompanies the story (which takes place over twenty years) as well as an impeccable historical reconstruction.

In addition to its refinement, this film also has a political dimension. Because public opinion in liberal Italy and the international Jewish community support the fight of the Mortaras who are up against the refusal of the Church and the Pope to return their child to them. The feature film therefore exposes the drama of a family and an entire people.

In addition, the release of the film echoes the present, the resurgent anti-Semitism in the world. Without supporting his message, Bellochio shows that the marriage between religion and power, celebrated by an anti-Semitic and corrupt pope, has long-term psychological consequences on the child and his loved ones.

Bellocchio has well directed an excellent cast of Italian actors. Let’s mention the wonderful performance of Paolo Pierobon in the role of Pope Pius IX! And that of the helpless parents played by Barbara Ronchi and Fausto Russo (Judge Falcone in The Traitor). Without forgetting the young interpreters of Edgardo as a child, Enea Sala, and as an adult, Leonardo Maltese, both moving.

At 84, Marco Bellocchio delivers a superb historical fresco, coupled with a vibrant plea against dogmatism and fanaticism. Religious and political…