Dante

Dante's 14th-century epic poem The Divine Comedy is one of the supreme masterpieces of Western literature, but it has proven stubbornly resistant to screen adaptation. Unlike most previous attempts—which tended to emphasize the places of posthumous punishment that Dante describes—this earnest but turgid effort from filmmaker Luca Lussoso covers all three volumes of the work: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. But the episodes are highly selective and set in modern times, with Dante bemoaning the death of his childhood love Beatrice, who persuades a white-robed Virgil to lead Dante out of the darkness toward the light, where her spirit will introduce him to beatitude. The actors (including Matteo Militerni/Palmerio Sortino and Arianna Saggese/Eleonora Pizzoccheri as the young/adult Dante and Beatrice, and Francesco Cevaro as Virgil) are clumsily situated against computer-generated backdrops and they recite their Italian dialogue rapidly (presented in tiny English subtitles that pass by swiftly). Periodically, Dante is shown scribbling recollections into a notebook, presumably writing the poem itself—a trope that quickly grows tiresome. While one has to laud Lussoso's effort to encourage students to study Dante, it's doubtful that this dreary, funereally-paced film will have that effect. Not a necessary purchase. Aud: H, C, P. (F. Swietek)