Nel più alto dei cieli

In the Highest of the Skies has a premise that Luis Bunuel could have made magic out of.

A diverse group of individuals are at the Vatician to meet the Pope. They get into a large freight elevator and press up. Minutes pass. Someone eventually mentions that they have all been in the elevator a long time. Still more minutes pass. The elevator display still clicks off floors ("There can't be that many floors"). Eventually, the passengers realize they are trapped in an elevator that is apparently moving constantly upward. Soon, tempers become short. First, a labor unionist, suffering from claustrophobia, becomes manic. A fellow passenger hits the unionist on the head killing him. Later, as everyone tries to sleep, a priest feels up a young girl, so he is tied up. Slowly, everyone in this holy party begin to turn on each other.

Unfortunately, Luis Bunuel did not make the film, which has little of Bunuel's humor. Instead, the filmmakers try to shock the viewer. Perhaps, if a viewer is strongly Catholic or unused to viewing strange films, but jaded viewers who have seen, say, Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom are going to wonder what the fuss is over. It is also clear that the characters are supposed to be archetypes (a stern mother superior, a lecherous priest, a communist, a journalist for a Catholic publication, etc.). Some of these types do not register as well for non-Italians living in the 21st Century.

Still, In the Highest of the Skies did hold my interest for its 80 some minutes, so I can't beat up on the film too harshly. However, if I get into a mood to re-watch a surrealist film about people seemingly supernaturally stranded in one location, it will be The Exterminating Angel.

Once in awhile a movie comes along that is about a group of priests, nuns, and other devout individuals who get trapped for an indefinite amount of time in an ultra-modern elevator in the Vatican and eventually lose all their moral bearings and indulge in all kinds of sins of the flesh culminating finally in cannibalism. Well, this is that movie! Actually, though, strange as this movie sounds, it's not totally without precedent. It's very similar to Luis Bunuel's "The Exterminating Angel" which is about a group of bourgeosis who are for some reason unable to leave a dinner party and, later, a church. This film is even more outrageous and exploitative than the Bunuel film though. It also resembles a series of extreme "survival" films that were popular at that time like "Survive!" or "Cyclone", but its not quite as graphic as those in its depiction of things like cannibalism.

It is definitely pretty blasphemous including scenes of people gorging themselves on communion wafers and sacramental wine, renouncing God (I think--it was Italian without subtitles), and the most outrageous scene has a priest feeling up a teenage girl (with his toe?!) and then humping her right in front of her parents and everybody (who are incredibly slow to react, perhaps so the more perverted viewers can enjoy this spectacle for several minutes). Of course, this scene is totally preposterous (after all, there is also a teenage BOY on the elevator that the priest could have molested). I'm not quite sure the point of all this debauchery and occasional blasphemy. Perhaps it is saying that beneath the veneer of civilization and morality, we are all little better than a collection of animalistic appetites. Not too uplifting I'm sure, but it may very well be true. I wouldn't recommend this movie to observant Catholics, or anyone who's is easily offended, but it is pretty interesting. It's different, a least