‘The Catholic School’ Netflix Movie Review - Straight from the Book Based on the Circeo Massacre

Although ‘The catholic school’ has been released on Netflix this week, it was released formally during the Venice film festival in the year 2021. The film was adapted from a novel based on true events that happened in Rome during the 70s.

The film starts by showing the lives of the students in a boys-only catholic school. The film has shown both the good and the bad sides of the school in the 70s. The kind of mindset the students have, the hold the elite class has on the school heads, etc have been displayed to give the audiences a hint into the lives of the elite boys during that time. Each character has their own story even though eventually it comes down to the main three characters.

 
Three boys – Angelo, Andrea, and Gianni, from the catholic school called San Leone Magno, belonging to the privileged elite classes of Rome, commits a crime that shocks both societies as well as their classmates. This is a true event that occurred years back, but the outside world does not know the lives or the premises these boys grew up in. Even though they did a horrifying crime, they are still strangers to outsiders. This film opens up their life, the premises in which they grew up, and later unfolds the horrific event to us as the movie proceeds. The film shows us the values of masculinity they had in themselves, which became a factor in all their actions.

The whole film has been divided into timelines before this event happened. Through these different timelines the film allows the audiences to understand the characters better, and their background and also slowly starts focusing on the main three characters as the timelines conclude. Something the film has failed at expressing is its need for focusing on the lives of a bunch of kids in the first half of the film, and then them becoming completely irrelevant in the next half. The second half of the film is all about the main three characters, who will make the audience confused about the time they have spent with the other characters and their importance in this film.

The whole setting of the film gives us a complete 70s vibe holding the authenticity to the original story. Be it how the characters look, their dresses, hairstyle, or the cars they use, everything screams the era they are talking about.

However, this one hour thirty minutes film can be considered watchable by audiences who love to watch dramas or real-life stories, or even stories related to social issues because ‘The Catholic School’ belongs to all of the genres above. The film also gives us information about the victims and the culprits after this horrific event happened, which is always interesting to hear. The fact that the entire film is based on true events, sort of promises us that there is quite a bit of triggering scenes towards the end, but it’s a great one-time watch for mature audiences.

Final Score – [7.5/10]
Reviewed by - Poornima Balsu
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