‘La Piedad,’ A Terrifying Take On Attachment, Heads To Fantasia
Holly Jones Off the heels of a world premiere at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, where he scooped the Proxima Special Jury Prize, writer-director Eduardo Casanova arrives in Montreal to screen his latest feature “La Piedad” (“La Pietà”) as part of the Queer Genre Cinema Spotlight at Fantasia. The screening marks its North American debut.The film offers a delightfully bizarre peek into the lives of manic and obsessive Libertad (Ángela Molina), a mother with an insatiable desire to be needed, and her son, Mateo (Manel Llunell), who warily leans into her toxic trappings as the pair become increasingly entwined.A personal story unfurls in tandem with a poignant subplot that likens their familial relationship to that of a populace and its dictator, showing that those in control of a mere few can use propaganda just as readily as a sadistic leader to manipulate their wards into submission.