NOSTALGIA

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 returns to Naples after spending 40 years 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.

It becomes clear that Felice’s childhood friend is now a grizzly, much-feared Camorra boss known as ‘the Badman’.

You can’t go home again. Or can you? Both things can be true at once, as evidenced by Nostalgia, an absorbing, finely tuned drama.

Prolific director Mario Martone, who co-wrote Nostalgia with wife Ippolita Di Majo has crafted a compelling, slow-burn of a story that masterfully winds its way to a resolution that’s as avoidable as it is inevitable: a poignant journey of sadness, regret, hope and perhaps a fateful dose of naivete…

Felice’s scenes with the gentle, loving Teresa are tender and bittersweet, especially one in which he must sponge-bathe his ill-cared-for mother. This results in sweet moments between them, even if it will prove ephemeral…

If yielding to nostalgia often makes people recall a more affectionate and wistful version of what actually was, this stirring, evocative film will likely leave viewers haunted by what might have been.

Film Facts

• Nostalgia was picked as the best international feature in the 2022 Oscars category.
• With 14 Oscar wins, Italy is the world champion in the best international feature category.
• It also featured at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival.