Napoli, Napoli, Napoli

I just saw this "documentary" at the London International Documentary Festival, presented by Abel Ferrara himself.

It is both a documentary and a fictional piece. The documentary part is the more interesting one. It mainly gives a portrait of the dark side of the city through a series of interviews to people in jail (mainly women) mixed with interviews to some locals that seemed quite randomly picked up (journalists, lawyers, activists, and even an incredibly naive, irresponsible and admittedly incapable lady Mayor). The result is not quite a precise statement, but more a chaotic and overall bitter portrait of the place.

Unfortunately the narrative of such documentary is fragmented by two fictional reconstructions of true stories of "ordinary" brutality not so well acted or significant, and possibly a bad copy of what has already been done in Gomorrah (which is a very good movie).

During the Q&A a few young people from the ghetto areas of the boroughs of Naples (the ones described as "mao-mao") challenged the director and the Neapolitan crew (the whole movie is written and produced in Naples) apparently because they could not understand the point of giving away such a gloomy and partial portrait of their native place by the hand of a US director. Abel tried his best to communicate his artistic aims. Sounds strange, but the movie is financed also by the Regional Tourist Bureau... maybe not a very smart investment! 6/10