Ecstasy
Manager: Marco Bellocchio
translators: Filippo Timi, Fabrizio Gifuni, Barbara Ronchi
Year: 2023
Premiere: 12/1/24
★★★★
Marco Bellocchio, at eighty four, remains one of cinema’s most relentless voices. In The Abduction, he reclaims a historical thread from Bologna in 1858 when the city lay under the Papal States. The story centers on the youngest of nine children born to a Jewish family who is secretly baptized. The Holy See asserts its claim over him, and a priest darkly declares, You are now a Christian forever, shaping a fate that will ripple through generations. Bellocchio uses this event to examine how institutions extend reach into private life, exploiting every legal loophole and moral ambiguity to redefine belonging and faith. The film probes the enduring tension between personal memory and institutional power, inviting viewers to question where loyalty truly resides and who defines it. This is not a tale of clear villains and virtuous heroes; it is a study of how systems bend truth to preserve control, a pattern that resonates far beyond its historical setting [Citation: Film Archive, International Cinema Review].
From the opening frames, a chilling atmosphere settles over the family’s home as authorities arrive with quiet authority to sever the ties that bind. The narrative unfolds with an almost clinical precision, yet Bellocchio threads in dreamlike images that hover between memory and nightmare. The director treats the family’s experience with a surgeon’s rigor and a poet’s sensitivity, capturing the slow erosion of identity as the boy is drawn away from his roots and remade into an emblem of religious conformity. There is a relentless claustrophobia in the scenes of interrogation and ceremonial ritual, a sense that power operates as a machine that consumes names, histories, and emotions. Bellocchio’s approach eschews melodrama for a steadier gaze that insists on complexity, reminding the audience that complicity wears many faces and that complicating questions often yield the most unsettling truths. The looser, more atmospheric passages invite the viewer to inhabit the boy’s perspective, producing a reaction that lingers long after the screen fades. In these moments, the film becomes a meditation on belief as a living, evolving force rather than a fixed doctrine, and it challenges the audience to discern where faith begins and fear ends. A recurring, almost hypnotic motif places the child on a boat at night, shrouded in fog, as if crossing a threshold between realms, a visual echo of Styx that hints at a passage from innocence to responsibility and the burden of chosen allegiance. The night scenes carry a dream logic that feels both intimate and uncanny, intensifying the sense of a world where spiritual boundaries are continually negotiated. Bellocchio also introduces unsettling images that haunt the mind, such as a vision of a rabbinic figure appearing in a private space, a provocative reversal that underscores the film’s overarching claim that religious authority is capable of entering every corner of a life, even in the most intimate moments. The artistry here lies as much in mood as in narrative progression; the film persuades through texture, sound design, and the careful pacing of contemplation, offering a form of realism that feels almost tactile in its precision [Citation: Filmmaker Interview Notes, 2024].
The Abduction does not present a simple indictment but a sober inquiry into how communities safeguard their beliefs by letting fear shape memory. Bellocchio, known for his unflinching honesty, never shies away from gray areas. He allows room for doubt and critique, ensuring that the portrayal remains a reflection on power rather than a declaration of guilt. In this light, the film becomes a provocative mirror for contemporary debates about religious coercion, cultural preservation, and the ways institutions claim legitimacy. The result is a work that feels both historically grounded and pressing in its existential questions. The performances anchor the film with a quiet intensity, converting historical events into living, breathing experiences that compel audiences to reevaluate what memory owes to truth and what truth owes to conscience. By the end, the viewer is left to weigh how much of what we inherit is a gift and how much is a responsibility that must be examined, revised, and sometimes resisted [Citation: Cinephile Quarterly, 2025].