Dormant Beauty

Isabelle Huppert and Toni Servillo star in Italian master Bellocchio’s compelling, somber ensemble drama in which a characters in three interrelated storylines struggle with the moral impasses and compromises of modern life. The film’s point of departure is a real-life right-to-euthanasia case that became a national controversy in 2008, culminating in a Parliamentary vote. (The film’s title might more precisely be “Sleeping Beauty.”) Against this backdrop Bellocchio attempts to encompass the differing values and outlook of young and old, reactionary and idealistic: that of a senator (Servillo) with a passionately pro-life daughter (Alba Rohrwacher) preparing to cast his vote on the issue; a retired actress and devout Catholic (Huppert) who tends to her own comatose daughter; and a troubled young doctor (Bellocchio’s brother, Pier Giorgio) who tries to help a suicidal methadone addict (Maya Sansa).

“Bellocchio takes an x-ray of the lingering malaise of late-Berlusconi Italy and its frightening intellectual and psychological confusion—and certainly touches a nerve.” —Olaf Möller, Film Comment (Nov/Dec 2012)