Set halfway through the 17th century, a church play is performed for the benefit of the young aristocrat Cosimo. In the play, a grotesque old woman gives birth to a beautiful baby boy. The child's older sister is quick to exploit the situation, selling blessings from the baby, and even claiming she's the true mother by virgin birth. However, when she attempts to seduce the bishop's son, the Church exacts a terrible revenge.
I've always found Peter Greenaway films rather hit or miss, and this rather theatrical effort I found more the latter. It all centres around a sort of immaculate conception birth at the Medici court and follows the anticipatory and resultant shenanigans as human nature is (quite literally) laid bare for all to see (and that nature doesn't always come off so well!) It has something of the bawdy romp to it, with some suitably appropriate ecclesiastical excesses and loads of colour - usually red - to liven it up. The story? Well though interesting for the first twenty minutes or so, I felt it fell into pantomime territory all too quickly. The cast are a collection of reasonably competent talent, but too much of the emphasis of this production is on the style, imagery along with an admittedly glorious choral score that does so much to add to the vivid and seamy look of this rather lengthy effort. The message is clear enough, but it has something of sledgehammer and nut to it; there is no subtlety or nuance to it, it's an intellectual brute of a film before a denouement that confirms what most of us - certainly those without religious convictions - may have expected from the outset. As with all of his films, this is certainly worth watching - but as to enjoying it, well I didn't really.