What are we to make of the mess that is Abel Ferrara’s Padre Pio? Linking those two names is already bizarre, and yet Ferrara appears to truly have found religion in the guise of Italy’s most popular and questionable 20th century saint, a man many members of the Church hierarchy of his day, including Pope John XXIII, knew was not what he claimed. This isn’t a biopic though – in fact, it’s not clear what Ferrara means for it to be since he’s attempted to graft Padre Pio’s early wrestling with his faith onto a 1920 massacre in his southern Italian hometown. Somewhere there’s supposed to be a connection between Padre Pio’s “man of the people” image and the fight between evil landowners and rabble-rousing Socialists, but the links are, to be generous, purely spiritual. Shia LaBeouf’s equally unlikely casting as the future saint will generate a certain buzz though very few sales.
Padre Pio may not be a household name outside Italy, but on the peninsula his image is inescapable: behind café cash registers, in taxis and trucks, on countless tombstones where his face replaces that of the deceased. Like Ché Guevara it’s almost always the same picture, grizzled and stern in his Capuchin robes, his hands swaddled in bloody bandages as a sign that he received Jesus’ wounds. There’s a 24-hour satellite channel whose cameras are permanently fixed on his tomb (thanked in the end credits), and those bandages regularly tour the country so the faithful can see proof of the supposed miracle. He was an unsympathetic and unforgiving man and yet he projected something that resonates with a large section of the populace; whatever that something is, it’s not been captured in Padre Pio.
Ferrara begins the film under the sway of Pasolini and ends, if one were generous, under the influence of a more devout Salut Marie. Exhausted soldiers returning to the small town of San Giovanni Rotondo in Puglia from the battlefields of World War I bring news of the dead and a hunger for social change which they instill in the simple-minded peasants. “This war led to nothing!” says one man, ignoring major territorial gains like Trieste, Trentino, etc. Ferrara isn’t interested in the finer points of history nor does he bother with three-dimensionality or even decent acting for that matter. The workers are good though simple folk stirred into resistance by Luigi Fiore (Vincenzo Crea), a young man connected by blood to the local notables but now on the side of the underdog (hmm, so the upper classes still save the lumpenproletariat?). That doesn’t sit well with Renato Alberizzi (Brando Pacitto), the bigwig running for mayor, or his proto-Fascist brother Gerardo (Marco Leonardi, especially ridiculous), who’s given to shouting lines like, “I’m gonna get the flag and stick it up your ass!”
Meanwhile, Padre Pio stays in his monastery, suffering from a crisis of faith and questioning whether he’s worthy of God’s love. LaBeouf trembles and groans, tormented by visions like a latter-day St. Anthony Abbot (though far less colorful). He never connects with what’s happening in town, but we’re meant to take for granted that his sympathies are with the social revolutionaries because… because… why exactly? The real Padre Pio delighted in his upper-class acolytes, whose significant contributions to his Order have kept it going strong long after his death in 1968. Ferrara ends the film with a sausage-fingered hand marked by the stigmata touching the titular character’s shoulder, passing on the wounds of Christ to this holy soul.
For those who believe – and clearly Ferrara does – the scene is designed to reflect the fervid nature of Padre Pio’s need for a sign from God, as well as his worthiness to receive such a rare mark. Those without such conviction – the Catholic faithful who view Padre Pio as a manipulative fraudster as well as non-believers just looking for a decent movie – will wonder why anyone should care about this self-involved man with no charisma. LaBeouf may have thrown himself into the character, but there’s no role here apart from sufferer, and as for the rest of the cast, forced to speak in heavily accented, unnatural English, this should not be seen as a reflection of their talents. Asia Argento crops up as a demon in the guise of a “Tall Man” confessing his lust for his teenage daughter; her fixed intensity fits the film, but that’s not a commendation. At least the film looks less murky than Ferrara’s recent efforts, at any rate in the village scenes. Joe Delia’s music reflects the overall absence of subtlety.
Director: Abel Ferrara
Screenplay: Abel Ferrara, Maurizio Braucci
Cast: Shia LaBeouf, Cristina Chiriac, Marco Leonardi, Asia Argento, Vincenzo Crea, Luca Lionello, Salvatore Ruocco, Brando Pacitto, Stella Mastrantonio, Anna Ferrara, Federico Majorana, Michelangelo Dalisi, Martina Gatti, Alessio Montagnani, Roberta Mattei, Ermanno De Biagi, Alessandro Cremona, Ignazio Oliva
Producers: Philipp Kreuzer, Diana Phillips
Co-producer: Maurizio Antonini
Executive producers: Christian Mercuri, Kyle Stroud, Alex Lebovici, David Haring, Roman Viaris, Gary Michael Walters, Jonathan Oakes, Ray Bouderau, Keanu Mayo
Cinematography: Alessandro Abate
Production designer: Tommaso Ortino
Costume designer: Antonella Cannarozzi
Editing: Leonardo Daniel Bianchi
Music: Joe Delia
Sound: Lavinia Burcheri
Production companies: Maze Pictures (Germany), Interlinea Film (Italy), Rimsky Productions (UK)
World sales: Capstone Studios
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Giornate degli Autori)
In English
104 minutes
