In Elisa , Leonardo Di Costanzo delves into the darkest corners of the human mind, that place where guilt and denial merge with survival. Inspired by a true story, the film is a co-production between Italy and Switzerland and follows Elisa, a 35-year-old woman imprisoned for over a decade for a brutal crime: killing and burning her own sister’s body. She claims to remember nothing. And perhaps that’s the only truth possible.
The director constructs a psychological drama that moves slowly, sometimes too slowly, but with purpose. Nothing is gratuitous. Silence speaks as much as speech, and Elisa’s gaze carries more questions than answers. By agreeing to participate in the research of renowned criminologist Alaoui—a specialist in family crimes—she finds herself forced to revisit what she fears most: her own memory.
L
ittle by little, fragments of the past emerge. A childhood marked by rejection; a mother who claimed she hadn’t loved her, a seemingly structured but emotionally devastated environment. Elisa grew up without affection, repressing her feelings until her anger became confused with fear. And when her fear overflowed, the crime occurred. She simply can’t face the reflection of what she was capable of doing.
The film proposes an uncomfortable reflection: what is guilt, after all? A moral burden, an instinct for self-protection, or just the name we give to that which we don’t know how to process? Costanzo articulates all of this through the sessions with Alaoui, who sees the criminal not as a monster, but as a human being, imperfect, flawed, and yet capable of redemption.
There is a stark contrast between the two examples of forgiveness presented: the father who visits his daughter twice a week in the penitentiary, and the mother in another case, who lost her son to murder and remains a prisoner of her own grief. One forgives the unforgivable; the other cannot survive hatred. Between them, the viewer is placed before a mirror, and the film asks: would you forgive a criminal?
The cold, almost clinical cinematography reinforces this distance between what is remembered and what is repressed. Elisa – The Veil of Guilt is a film about memory and denial, but also about humanity, about what remains when the punishment has been served, but forgiveness has not yet arrived.
Costanzo understands that looking at the past is the true prison. And perhaps forgiveness—of others and of oneself—is the only possible way out.
You can find Elisa – The Veil of Guilt at the Rio Film Festival.
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