“Kidnapped” at National Center for Jewish Film's Annual Film Festival 2024

BOSTON PREMIERE

Legendary Italian director Marco Bellocchio’s latest is a grand, historical fresco depicting a scandalous true story. In 1858, in the Jewish quarter of Bologna, the Pope’s soldiers burst into the home of the Mortara family to take Edgardo (Enea Sala), their seven-year-old son, who the church says was secretly baptized as a baby. Supported by public opinion and the international Jewish community, the Mortaras’ struggle to have their son returned takes on a political dimension.

Awash in painterly chiaroscuro evoking the masterworks of Caravaggio and Delacroix, Kidnapped uses light and shadow to convey the baroque drama of the events. Kidnapped is at once a personal, human-scale narrative of a family in crisis who will do anything to retrieve their child from the clutches of a ruthless theocratic government, and a wide-scope portrait of a country on the cusp of revolution. (Directed by Marco Bellocchio. Italy | 2023 | Italian and Hebrew with English subtitles)

“A gripping, heartbreaking true political crime story from the pages of history.” — The Guardian

“Jaw-dropping.” — Screen Daily

“An engaging and fascinating film.” — The Hollywood Reporter

Screening at The National Center for Jewish Film’s Annual Film Festival
May 12 – 21, 2024
www.jewishfilm.org