Naples’ violent crime syndicate the Camorra casts a large shadow in the city’s literature – and Mario Martone’s Nostalgia, based on a 2016 novel by Ermanno Rea, is full of ruthless moped-riding spectres. Felice, played by Pierfrancesco Favino, returns to Naples after spending 40 years in in Lebanon and Egypt to find that his mother has grown old and his home has become alien to him. He stumbles with the volcanic gutturals of the Neapolitan dialect, forgetting words and struggling to explain himself.
His displacement, and the danger that is crawling up from the past, is communicated beautifully both through Favino’s expressive face and Paolo Carnera’s cinematography. The camera dwells ominously and at disconcerting angles on the sallow light of stairwells, peeling walls and dodgy electrical wiring.
The film, slow at first, gets into gear with the introduction of social justice priest Don Luigi (Francesco Di Leva) to whom Felice makes a terrible confession that explains why he lingers in the city. Flashbacks, sepia-tinted, appear more frequently as the story progresses, and it becomes clear that Oreste, Felice’s childhood friend, is now a grizzly, much-feared Camorra boss known as Badman.
The feeling of nostalgia is perhaps overstressed, and the pacing is odd. But the tension created as foolish Felice drifts into a trap of his own making is magnetic, even if the horribly-ever-after is infuriatingly predictable.
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ANTICIPATION.
All looks a bit gloomy from the outset… 3
ENJOYMENT.
Absorbing after you’ve made it through the first 20 minutes. 4
IN RETROSPECT.
Frustrating, but would love to see a spin-off series about Don Luigi’s divinely inspired quest for vengeance. 3
Directed by
Mario Martone
Starring
Pierfrancesco Favino, Tommaso Ragno, Francesco di Leva
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