Review: 'Kidnapped' is a harrowing historical drama, putting a human face to the cruelty of religious bigotry

Italian director Marco Bellocchio’s “Kidnapped” (“Rapito”) depicts a gut-wrenching piece of history that some consider pivotal in the creation of modern Italy, though mostly forgotten — but it’s power comes from how it centers nation-shaking events around the plight of a little boy.

Late one night in 1858, a marshal and two gendarmes arrive at the home of the Mortara family in Bologna, Italy. The marshal (Bruno Cariello) informs the family’s patriarch, Salomone Mortara (Fausto Russo Alesi), and his wife, Marianna (Barbara Ronchi), who are Jewish, that their 6-year-old son Edgardo (played at this age by Enea Sala) is to be taken away from his family. 

Little Edgardo has committed no crime. The marshal is doing this under the authority of the Catholic Church — which is the law in this part of Italy — because the Grand Inquistitor, Monsignor Feletti (Fabrizio Gifuni), has been told that Edgardo was baptized as a baby, and therefore must be raised as a Christian. Salomone tries to plead his case to Feletti, but the priest is unmoved. 

Feletti tells Salomone that little Edgardo will likely stay in Bologna, and that his family can occasionally visit him. This is a lie — the first of many told by various priests — as Edgardo is immediately put on a boat for Rome, where he is put in a Catholic orphanage and made to attend Mass every morning and learn Christian prayers in Latin. 

Pope Pius IX (Paolo Pierobon) takes personal interest in Edgardo’s case, which becomes an international incident — as Jewish advocates across Europe and even in America decry the cruel taking of a boy away from his parents over a dubious claim of baptism. (In Boston, the Pope is told, a theater group performed a skit in which His Holiness is held down and forcibly circumcised —  a thought that shows up in the Pope’s nightmare.) Pius remains unmoved, even when told that one of the Church’s biggest supporters, France’s Napoleon III, is displeased with Edgardo’s kidnapping. Pius’ reply: “I am the Pope. I answer only to God.”

Though Bellocchio (who directed the 2019 Mafia drama “The Traitor”) and co-screenwriter Susanna Nicchiarelli dig into the political furor caused by Edgardo’s case. Among other things, depicting Edgardo’s older brother Riccardo (Samuele Teneggi) as one of the rebels who represent the unified Italy that aims to break the Pope’s stranglehold on the country’s laws. Riccardo soon encounters the adult Edgardo (Leonardo Maltese) as he embarks on his career as a priest.

The movie’s more resonant moments come when Bellocchio depicts how this Jewish family — separated by bigotry and rigid adherence to Catholic doctrine — is made to suffer as part of this religious power grab. “Kidnapped” illustrates, with the emotional force of grand opera, the cruelty inflicted by people claiming in God’s name that they know what’s best.

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‘Kidnapped” (“Rapito”)

★★★1/2

Opens Friday, June 7, at the Broadway Centre Cinemas (Salt Lake City). Not rated, but probably PG-13 for language and situations with a child in peril. Running time: 133 minutes; in Italian, Hebrew and Latin, with subtitles.