A warm June night in Bologna in 1858: The Jewish Mortara family is experiencing a day like any other when the papal police knock on the door. The religious law enforcement officers demand access to the family’s youngest son. They snatch Edgardo from his mother’s arms and disappear into the night. What remains is despair and a loss that becomes more severe with each passing day.
In his new film, Marco Bellocchio tells the story of the boy from a Jewish home who is kidnapped and re-educated by the Catholic Church. With the realization of The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope, the Italian master succeeded in a project that Steven Spielberg had already wanted to film before him. The American failed. His presence in the new film is not missed at all.
Why Bellocchio succeeded where Spielberg failed
Around seven years ago, Spielberg wanted to film The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara. Oscar winner Mark Rylance was cast as Pope Pius IX and Oscar Isaac as the older Edgardo. Spielberg had over 2,000 young actors line up for the lead role, Deadline reported at the time. But the search yielded no results. The director who brought fame to child actors in ET: The Extra-Terrestrial and Jurassic Park, couldn’t find the right boy. He dropped the project and turned to West Side Story.
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The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope
Enter Marco Bellocchio. The Italian director had been toying with the project for a long time, but it was only Spielberg’s rejection that cleared the way for him. At first Bellocchio (Il Traditore – As a key witness against the Cosa Nostra) faced the same problem. How do you find a young actor who can do justice to the traumatic fate of Edgardo Mortara? He told Variety at Cannes this year:
Before I started shooting, I was very worried about this aspect. Kids these days tend to be very fake because of the social media they are exposed to. I knew we had to find a child who had a soul.
This child is Enea Sala. The boy from Bologna makes an impressive film debut in the historical drama.
The Pope as a deranged villain
Enea Sala plays little Edgardo. Under the pretext that the boy was secretly baptized and is therefore no longer allowed to be raised in a Jewish family, he is, so to speak, forcibly adopted by the church. From now on, the film follows three narrative strands: the religious re-education of the boythe struggle of the parents and the Pope’s perfidious strategy.
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The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope
Paolo Pierobon plays with Pius IX. one of the great film villains of the year, not a sadistic beast, but a man of power whose humanity has been eaten away by paranoia and his own hubris. As his authority in other areas crumbles, the boy is made an example of: If the Pope orders Edgardo to be a Christian, he will, no matter what law and conscience say.
Opposite him is the tender soul of Edgardo, who finds himself in a strange world of crucifixes and Latin texts. In The Bologna Kidnapping a story is told that makes you angry, but it does so with impressive sensitivity. The inner life of the boy is carefully observed as he longs for his family and possibly finds refuge in the image of the suffering Jesus on the cross. Bellocchio plays with perspectives, switching from surreal dream visions to cold, marble reality.
The trump card of the thriller is ambiguity. Instead of dwelling on anger over the Vatican’s actions, Bellocchio explores how the loss of his parents and the rigid Catholic upbringing go hand in hand psychologically and change the boy’s worldview. Such a multi-layered insight into a soul tormented and comforted by faith is rarely seen in the cinema.
The Bologna Kidnapping – Robbed in the Name of the Pope has been showing in German cinemas since November 16th.