Documenting the Deterioration of a City

Napoli Napoli Napoli blurayDIRECTED BY ABEL FERRARA/Italian/2009

STREET DATE: July 12, 2016/ RARO VIDEO and KINO LORBER

There’s no reason to think the Abel Ferrara documentary Napoli Napoli Napoli isn’t from the heart. Just the idea of the uber-talented provocateur taking a break from his narrative films, which tend to be more masterpieces than not, to focus on a true story, whatever that story may be, should be enough to get you to pay attention.

In Napoli Napoli Napoli, the focus is Naples, Italy and the slow deterioration of the city. A city that is very effected by crime. One interviewee states a certain neighborhood is one of the better areas because you are “less likely to get robbed.”

Ferrara takes a hands-off approach, perhaps because he is an American and didn’t feel the right to come into another country and start dictating things. But it ends up giving you and “alrighty then” feeling when it is over.

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The two factors contributing to this destruction are the mafia and drugs. It’s also how the film is split up. You see interviews with people who are in prison. Most of them are in for drug charges. The other half of the film is filled with dramatic recreations of major crime that has happened in the city, mostly through the mafia.

The film lacks for two reasons. It is definitely meaningful and heartfelt to Ferrara, and for that I applaud him, but on the other hand, it just lacks an artistry that I expected from such a director. The film should have reflected his passion some more. Instead, the talking-head interviews with prisoners are boring and something akin to an episode of 60 Minutes. The dramatic recreations (take the word “dramatic” very relatively) reminded me of episodes of Unsolved Mysteries.

The amateur feel to it also goes in line with the disjointed messages in the film. Other talking-head interviews, besides of the prisoners, were of random people in the community: journalists, lawyers, activists, etc. But the connection of these people and what they were saying was hard to place my finger on. It felt like they were just random people on the street he grabbed.

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On top of that, the message of the film was hard to place. The mafia seems to be the major problem. The women in prison who were arrested for drugs seems to be government overkill. Are the two connected? Or should the government be paying more attention to the former over the latter?

Ferrara takes a hands-off approach, perhaps because he is an American and didn’t feel the right to come into another country and start dictating things. But it ends up giving you and “alrighty then” feeling when it is over.

Ferrara can be an amazing filmmaker. He can also be frustrating. Napoli Napoli Napoli is an example of why he can be frustrating. For a more informative approach to Naples, I’d recommend avoiding this documentary, and possibly any other documentary on the subject, and watch the riveting narrative film Gomorrah instead.

The film is shot on HD and has a documentary style, besides the reenactment scenes that are “slightly” more cinematic. Special features include a Backstage 33’53”, an illustrated booklet and a trailer.

The images used in the review are present only as a reference to the film and are not meant to reflect the actual image quality of the Blu-ray.