The Spiral

They were the envy of everyone in Bari, Italy: The ideal couple, beautiful and successful, living in a tastefully appointed estate with an aspiring model and actress daughter and a soccer star son. That is, until a single tragedy leads to a Faustian bargain with a mysterious stranger, spiraling into a life of mounting catastrophe. Framed by a confession from matriarch Anna to her estranged daughter Alice, the latest twisted fable from The Holy Boy (2025 ChicagoIFF) director Paolo Strippoli chronicles the misfortunes befalling each member of this once-idyllic family and the high cost of maintaining a facade of perfection.