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MovieMail's Review
Matteo Garrone’s Gomorrah is a stark and relevant look at the all-pervasive organised crime network in Naples. The most authentic film about mafia crime ever made, it has been lifting festival awards worldwide, from Cannes to Chicago to Munich, and was recently voted # 2 in Sight and Sound’s annual poll of best films. It is based closely on the book by Roberto Saviano, whose frank and fervent exposé has provoked death threats. He now lives with a permanent police escort.
Fuelled by crime, drug abuse and fear, the Campania region’s criminal network – the Camorra – is responsible for weapons trading, toxic waste disposal, fake designer goods, slave labour and a shocking Chinese immigrant body count. Garrone presents these facts in a fly-on-the-wall documentary style, following a number of individuals as their lives are traumatically affected by Camorra contact. The narrative dips in and out of each individual’s story, there are no contrived characters or scenarios, there’s no ostentatious editing, nor any attempt to manipulate our emotions. Its unequivocal authenticity is shocking.
Five stories are tracked through the course of the film. Most poignant is that of 13 year-old Toto whose childish eagerness to join the Camorra ends in the death of his neighbour, an innocent woman whom he decides to betray. Another character, haute couture tailor Pasquale, agrees to train the staff of an underground factory, briefly liberating himself from the mafia-controlled employment situation which exploits him. He finds respect but soon pays for his insubordination with the brutal murder of his new business partner.
What Garrone conveys most powerfully is the sheer scale of the problem. The film is set in the warren-like, shabby housing blocks of Naples’ suburbs where poverty encourages Camorra engagement. Wide aerial shots capture the overwhelming numbers – masses of ordinary people whose daily lives are inescapably tainted. The atmosphere is tense and volatile; Camorristas switch allegiances as easily as they pull the trigger on an innocent teenager or mother. Gommorah is an eye-opening and brave depiction of the misery and far-reaching consequences of mafia rule, presented without embellishment.
Power, money and blood: these are the values that the residents of the province of Naples and Caserta confront every day. They have practically no choice, and are forced to obey the rules of the System, the Gomorra.
Only a lucky few can even think of leading a normal life. Five stories are woven together in this violent scenario, set in a cruel and ostensibly invented world, but one that is deeply rooted in reality.
This hard-hitting, controversial inside look at Italy's modern-day crime families is based on the book by Roberto Saviano, who is now permanently under police protection for exposing the Camorra's activities. The Camorra say they want him dead by Christmas.
