Rapito Kidnapped: The Abduction of Edgardo Mortara

Official Selection, 2023 Cannes Film Festival

Official Selection, 2023 Toronto International Film Festival

Palme d’Or winning director Marco Bellochio tells the true story of the Mortara family. In the Jewish quarter of Bologna in 1858, it was discovered that the seven-year-old son of the Mortara family was secretly baptized as a baby by his nurse. On this matter, the Papal law is unquestionable: he must receive a Catholic education. So by order of the Cardinal, soldiers seize their child. Distraught, his parents will do anything to get their son back. Supported by public opinion and the international Jewish community, the family’s struggle quickly take on a political dimension and becomes entangled in the larger clash between the realms of Catholic authoritarianism and the aspirations for equality and the unification of Italy.

Guest: Alberto Zambenedetti, Associate Professor in the Department of Italian Studies and the Cinema Studies Institute, University of Toronto

Co-presented with: