Vatican paper decries church abuse film

VENICE, Italy -- The Vatican newspaper denounced a film at the Venice Film Festival that recounts the story of an abusive Catholic convent, calling "The Magdalene Sisters" an "angry and rancorous provocation." \nThe film, in competition at the ongoing Venice Film Festival, received strong reviews from critics after its screening this week. But the Vatican's Osservatore Romano newspaper disagreed. \n"The fact that the priest is a hypocrite ... is written on his face and is like a mark that the director seems to suggest is cut into all priests," the article says. \nPeter Mullan's film tells the story of one of the Magdalene convents, which were run by nuns on behalf of the Catholic Church. According to the film, women were imprisoned and tormented in the convents for often absurd and cruel reasons, such as having been raped. \nMullan's film focused on the mistreatment of four women in one convent during the 1960s. The last Magdalene convent in Ireland closed in 1996. \nThe Osservatore Romano article said the film was "incautiously allowed to pass as a work of art at the Venice festival." \nMullan's work is up for a Golden Lion in the main Venice 59 section, which will be awarded Sunday. \nAnother film sparking controversy at the festival was "Ken Park," by American directors Larry Clark and Edward Lachman. The film tells the story of three boys and one girl in California, and features explicit depictions of sex and violence. \nClark, best known for 1995's "Kids" and last year's "Bully," has made a series of films that express a harsh view of teenage life, full of drugs, cruelty and graphic sex. \nHe acknowledged that his latest film's explicit scenes could limit its theatrical distribution, but added that he was only depicting the reality of youths' lives. "Why turn away?" he said at a news conference Wednesday. "These images are not unusual." \nThe festival ends Sept. 8, when the jury hands out the Golden Lions in the main Venice 59 section, while a second jury will award prizes in the Upstream category.