In 1900 Italy, young Agata has a stillborn child who, according to her religion, cannot be baptized having not taken its first breath. Horrified at the thought of her infant being interred unbaptized and without a name, and thus condemned to limbo, she embarks on a journey to save its soul.
Agata (Celeste Cescutti) hears rumors of a place far away in the mountains where stillborn babies can be resurrected just long enough to take a breath and be baptized. Against her husband’s wishes, against the Catholic church itself, and facing enormous risks to herself in the harsh terrain of Northeastern Italy, Agata sets off, her child tucked in a small box. Along the way she meets the thief Lynx (Ondina Quadri), who agrees to assist Agata in reaching her destination as long as he can have the contents of the box. ‘[A] beguiling and mythic drama.” —Wendy Ide, Screen Daily
Director Biography
Born in 1989 in Trieste, Italy, Laura Samani studied at the University of Pisa and at Rome’s Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia. She is the director of Città visibile (2019) and the short films “Rosso liquido” (2013) and “The Sleeping Saint”. Small Body (21) is her debut feature.
Sponsors
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