St. Rita of Cascia

I don't think I've ever heard much about St. Rita, but in my blog-reading a few months ago, I stumbled across a bunch of recommendations for saint movies.  I put them all on my Netflix queue that day, and St. Rita was the first one to come up.

This movie is 3hr. 20 mins. long (!) and as far as I'm concerned it was worth every minute.  Meg and Pip were watching it with me, and I certainly didn't expect to make it through such a long saint movie in one sitting.  Lord of the Rings, extended version, yes.  Saint, no.   I thought we'd watch an hour a day, or something like that, until it was done.

We never got to a stopping place.  At one point, I tried to stop; we grabbed the remote to pause it between scenes, but the next scene started and just those 3 seconds made us want to continue.  So we sat through the whole thing, and I loved every minute of it!

It helps that the actress playing Rita was stunningly beautiful.  The guy playing her husband is no slouch in the looks department, either, even though he's a bit of a bad guy.

According to my sources at home, they took lots of liberties with the story, but I think it was well-done, nonetheless.  I thought she was beautifully portrayed as a real person, and it was very interesting to see how one could love a husband who had some serious moral faults.

I got to watch it a second time before returning it because I turned it on for my DH on Sunday and he watched the whole thing, too.  I kept thinking I'd tell him that we can fast-forward through this part, but it really seemed that we couldn't.  

I highly recommend St. Rita, with the caveat that it is Not Rated, but it should be at least PG-13 for the violence.  I didn't expect it to be as graphic as it was, but Meg (9) sat through it; she may have covered her eyes a bit on her own, although I couldn't warn her what was coming.  The 2nd time when she was in the room, she definitely covered up!  There were several instances of a sword being driving straight through someone.  I got a little worried on the wedding night, too, but that was a bit less graphic---lots of kissing and then they panned from the bed to the window.  Whew!

Does anyone have a good book on St. Rita that they recommend?  Or any other great Saint movies?