Fuocoammare, par-delà Lampedusa

Gianfranco Rosi made a very good documentary about the problem of immigration and the situation in the isle of Lampedusa, comparing the daily life of the italian citizens with the troubles of the women, men and children who need to cross the Adriatic sea to survive. He didn't use actors but real people in their real lives, for this reason the result is realistic, powerful and emotional. It shows many situations that we don't want to see and to know, using a good point of view and without being demagogic. The movie deserves all the awards that it won.

I realize that the film was meant to show how the lives of the islanders were impacted by the refugee crisis, but it didn't. The film showed endless footage of a young boy playing, making catapults, pretending to shoot down aircraft? birds? shooting at cactus, getting his eyes tested, and a friend riding his scooter. There was footage of his family life, mama cooking, peeling vegetables, the family eating, mama making a bed. A DJ playing requests, and on, but no scenes of the interaction with the refugees/migrants. We saw the coast guard rescuing dying migrants from overcrowded boats, the immigration people processing them and the doctor examining and talking about them. There was an African migrant screaming like a gospel preacher about the hardships they had endured and those who have died en route, but for all we saw, the residents seemed to live a life apart and are totally unaffected if not unaware of the hundreds of thousands of migrants who have ended up on their small island.

The film did show the comfortable orderly lives of the islanders and their comfortable homes, contrasting with the destitution of the migrants who have lost everything - their homes, jobs, family members and face an uncertain future after a hazardous and sometimes deadly journey, but other than the doctor, no one seemed particularly bothered.

Questions which were not answered, where are the migrants getting all the money for the journey, which seems to cost around $10,000 and more. Just the boat trip from Libya to Lampedusa costs between $1,500 and $850 depending on your place in the boat, and seeing as most of the migrants are from Central Africa, getting to Libya must cost ten times more. What are the smugglers doing with all their money which must run into hundreds of millions by now. Where is it being laundered. What is being done to catch the smugglers? Are the migrants really in peril and facing death, or are they being enticed by the people smugglers with false claims of a land of milk and honey. If the latter, why are they not writing (or phoning on the ubiquitous cell phones) to warn their friends and family not to come? Perhaps it is compassion fatigue, but as we saw the dead migrants being unloaded from the tiny overcrowded boat, I was reminded of the cry of 'Bring out your dead' in the days of the plague.

FIRE AT SEA won the 'Golden Bear' best picture award at the Berlin Film Festival in February. Part documentary, part docudrama, it was filmed on the Italian island of Lampedusa, which lies roughly midway between Libya and Sicily and has become the first port of call for more than 100,000 migrants from Africa and the Middle East. Over 15,000 have drowned, dying to be set free from terror and tyranny and poverty.

We see the Italian navy rescuing migrants from their sinking overcrowded boats and dinghies; many of them are in a desperate condition after days at sea. We get glimpses of the 'internment camp'where they wait to be processed and sent on to their uncertain future in a Europe which is increasingly unwelcoming.

Alternating with the refugee crisis, the film's main focus is Samuele, a 12-year-old Lampedusan who lives with his fisherman father and grandmother. The family play themselves in the style of a Pasolini movie (minus the sex and the blasphemy). We watch Samuele slurping spaghetti, struggling with homework, playing with a slingshot. They seem to have a very limited awareness of the migrant situation, although that is perhaps only the director's way of pointing up the contrast between the ordinariness of their lives and the appalling tragedy taking place in the waters around their island.

This heart-wrenching film offers no solution to the crisis. How could it? There clearly isn't one.

The subject of this documentary is Lampedusa, a small Italian island south of Sicily. The camera follows the ordinary activities of its local inhabitants while also exposing the migrants who end up there on crowded makeshift boats: Africans fleeing despair and persecution from their various homelands.

The style of this film is cinema-vérité, simply observing the various subjects in a very quiet way. Most of the attention is given to the island residents, particularly a twelve-year old boy. In the beginning, there are occasional feelings of boredom but once getting used to the meditative style, the movie is quite rewarding.

At first, one might wonder why there is less attention on the migrants but this eventually becomes understandable. If they had been the main subject, it is possible the viewer would feel overwhelmed and numb by the end. The smaller number of scenes end up having a greater impact. While not always horrific, the viewer sees up close the people behind the headlines - the migrants as well as the rescuers. Emotions run high before the viewer is bought back to daily routine life on the island which seems very distant from the lives of the migrants.

Director Gianfranco Rosi is very wise in avoiding any methods to heighten the real-life drama. The approach as a simple witness works perfectly especially in some highlighted scenes: the despair of a local doctor who is distressed by the plight of so many; a Nigerian refugee recounting the plight of his former country and finding more trouble in Libya as he and others traveled north; and of course, the indescribable feelings of seeing a large boat with hundreds of people cramped in it.

A film with such a sharp artistic take on the european migrant crisys and the everyday life of a Lampedusa's family that is a must watch for everyone.