Abrasive lampoon of one woman’s hysterical love of Jesus. “I laughed uproariously throughout this horrifying portrait of a religious fanatic, and if there’s something the matter with you, you will, too.” — John Waters
You’ll wince, laugh and be shocked, sometimes all at once.
Screened as part of NZIFF 2013
PARADISE Faith 2012
PARADIES: Glaube
For Anna Maria, an X-ray technician (and sister of PARADISE: Love’s Teresa), a holiday provides the opportunity to head out for a spot of door-to-door evangelism, toting her two-foot plaster Mary into the homes of anyone foolish, confused or lonely enough to let her across the threshold. But at heart Anna Maria’s devotion is a frantically private affair, self-administered in bouts of flagellation or progressions around her obsessively spotless apartment on her knees. When Anna Maria’s estranged, wheelchair-bound and devoutly Muslim husband appears from who-knows-where, God may have sent a trial too many. Seidl’s lampoon of hysterical faith seems perfectly designed to enrage the embattled righteous, but in more charitable souls it may induce pity and wonder. “I laughed uproariously throughout this horrifying portrait of a religious fanatic, and if there’s something the matter with you, you will, too.” — John Waters, Artforum (Best Films of 2012)