Dante’s Inferno

Anchor Bay

R4 DVD

Dante’s Inferno is an unusual animated film based on a computer game. To start with I have some misgivings about Dante’s Inferno as a work of literature anyway. While significant, it is a work saturated with sin, suffering and religious dogma to such a degree that much of it is painfully repugnant. However, it is considered a classic book and should engender such degree of respect. The interpretation offered in this animated film is strange indeed, since it is based on an interactive computer game every scene seems to be “slash and burn” with Dante tearing his way through hell with his sword. It is a bloody vision indeed filled with demons cut to pieces, torn apart and ripped asunder. This mixture of violence and constant religious dialogues about the value of suffering, pain and sin makes a rather uncomfortable union; one that does not sit well.

The film itself is visually appealing with Virgil leading Dante on a Chivalric quest through hell to supposedly save Beatrice but in actuality to redeem himself from acts of violence he has committed while on Crusade. There are some fascinating criticisms of the Church, political institutions and the extremism of the Crusades, but generally the film follows a surprisingly conservative interpretation of the work.

The nine levels of the inferno are superbly presented. Limbo opens the film with some impressive baby demons which have been created from the souls of unbaptized children. This is also where the philosophers of non-Christian faiths reside from Plato to Buddha, so much for tolerance and respect.

The second level is Lust and includes some rather naughty randy female demons. Along the way we hear some interesting reflections from Lucifer himself. While he may have introduced sin, many spread it like a disease. Man made earth a Hell, not Lucifer.

The third level is gluttony and exists inside the gut of the gigantic Cerberus whose black heart Dante must destroy to reach the next level. Once again the film seems too much like a computer game with bosses at each level which must be confronted and killed and tasks which must be completed.

Greed is next and then followed by Anger whose realm is within the black sludge of the river Styx. Dante then enters the City of Dis where he enters the realm of the heretics. He must fight his way through the tombs of heresy and confront the Minotaur before entering the 7th level of violence where such leaders as Alexander and Atilla reside. We also find here the wood of suicides since the Church decrees that individuals cannot even control their own time of death regardless of their suffering. The constant emphasis on suffering, sin and pain gets a bit much especially coupled with the slash and burn mentality of Dante as portrayed in the film. It might look great but this is not a nuanced or textured presentation. Fraud is the eighth level where the three great rivers of Hell meet leading to the 9th level which is the circle of Traitors. Here Dante much face Lucifer himself and through a rather pitiful display of grovelling repentance he gains entry to purgatory.

Dante’s Inferno is a visual feast but a failure when it comes to content. The constant mixture of “Catholic guilt” with violence makes an uncomfortable mix and many will find the religious dialogue off-putting. If you view the tale as simply another piece of mythology it can be enjoyed as an interesting work of animated entertainment but with so much religious extremism in the world today that is a hard ask.

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This review will appear in Volume 3 No.2 of the digital and print edition of Synergy Magazine.

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