AllMovie

In this politically and socially symbolic film, the setting is ostensibly the 1697 trial in Italy of Catarina Ross (Daniella Morelli) for witchcraft, yet the ruthless interrogation of the woman takes place in a warehouse, next to a railroad, with modern, motorized sounds in the background. She is shown on-camera while her interrogator (Massimo Sacilotto) is off-camera like a disembodied voice. He is alternately avuncular and strident, cajoling and threatening. Accusers come forward and torment her, she is asked to name others like herself, she is tortured. Her timeless situation seems doomed to play itself out, reaching the same ending and starting all over, one century after another.