Perfect Obedience

Julián Santos, a 13-year-old seminarian, is sent to live with Padre Ángel de la Cruz, the religious leader and figurehead of the Catholic seminary Los Cruzados de Cristo, in Mexico. There, Julian is told he will have to follow the three steps of St Ignatius of Loyola: supposedly a hard spiritual journey meant to lead Julian to achieve "the perfect obedience," but in actuality a method used by De la Cruz to groom the teenage boy into compliance with sexual acts. Based in part on Ernesto Alcocer's novel Perversidad, and on the true story of the Legion of Christ founder Marcial Maciel, whose long history of child abuse was not addressed until 2006 and only publicly acknowledged in 2009. --