In the Hand of Dante is all over the place. The narrative advertised by its title, of medieval Italian poet Dante Alighieri’s struggle to write his epic poem, The Divine Comedy, competes for screen time with a neo-noir story in which a fictional version of Nick Tosches, the late author of the book on which this film is based, is recruited by a crime boss to authenticate the poem’s long-lost original manuscript.
Oscar Isaac plays both Dante and Tosches. Gerard Butler stars as an unpredictable, “I woke up and chose violence” hitman who accompanies Tosches to Italy, as well as Pope Boniface VIII, who exiles Dante from his native Florence. (The two belonged to opposing factions vying for control of the great Italian city-state, with Dante supporting civic independence from the Vatican.)
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