(Bella addormentata) The seventy-four-year-old Italian master Marco Bellocchio remains steeped in all the vitality and fury of life and politics in “Dormant Beauty,” a keenly etched tragedy based on an occasion where Italy was inflamed by the case of a woman in a coma and an ensuing public battle about euthanasia. Bellocchio twines four stories, each with their own moments of volcanic dramatic power, into one pulsing mosaic. (Some minor missteps don’t mar the movie.) The score by Carlo Crivelli is empathetic, emphatic and essential to the emotional success of “Dormant Beauty.” With Toni Servillo, Isabelle Huppert, Alba Rohrwacher. 115m. (Ray Pride)
“Dormant Beauty” opens Friday, July 18 at the Davis.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s film critic and a contributing editor to Filmmaker magazine.
His multimedia history of Chicago “Ghost Signs” will be published soon. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram as Ghost Signs Chicago. More photography on Instagram.
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