While harshly critical of the deadening effects of religious dogmatism director Alice Rohrwacher is never crudely so. She manages to inject some level of sympathy for the abusive catechism teacher as well as the careerist priest while having the most negative person be the very secular, cruelly teasing older sister of the main character. I also like how the film's dramatics never veer into histrionics. In other words, Rohrwacher has a steady, controlling hand, for me a sure sign of a good film maker. Another indication is her ability to coax an amazingly fine performance from a child actor as she does here with Yie Vianello as the traumatized yet rebellious 13 year old Marta. I hope to see more of this fine director's work as well as Vianello's subsequent film, "Sow The Wind". Give it an A minus. (Why not an A? Well, for one, I would have liked more of an examination of why Marta's dad ignores her and prefers the horrendous older sister. And for another I wanted to know why Marta's family had to move from Switzerland to Calabria which, on the trauma scale, is like going from Boulder Colorado to Greenville Mississippi.)
Review of Corpo Celeste
