Lontano in Fondo Agli Occhi/An Impure Glance
D: Giuseppe Rocca; with Giusi Saija, Andrea Refuto, Mariagrazia Galasso, Antonio Pennarella. (35mm, 95 min.)
The Catholic machine gets another working over in this Italian coming-of-age story about a young boy and his love for the house servant, a brash, sexually loose young woman. At church and at home, the little boy is throttled with the notion that man is evil, and his coming of age consists of his own induction into that “evil.” Every inch of this film is washed with a religious fervor and fear, manifest in needlessly surreal, often apocalyptic visions and bedtime “lullabies” chronicling God’s wrath. But there’s nothing revelatory in it, making for another tired exercise in Catholic guilt. The picture takes on the same look of the rubble and crumble of this postwar village, making for a dingy, dishwater-looking film that’s on the same par of tedium as a dozen Hail Marys. (CC, 3/17, 5:30pm)
This article appears in March 16 • 2001.
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A graduate of the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas, Kimberley has written about film, books, and pop culture for The Austin Chronicle since 2000. She was named Editor of the Chronicle in 2016; she previously served as the paper’s Managing Editor, Screens Editor, Books Editor, and proofreader. Her work has been awarded by the Association of Alternative Newsmedia for excellence in arts criticism, team reporting, and special section (Best of Austin). The Austin Alliance for Women...
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