10/09/2022 - VENICE 2022: Actor-director Vincenzo Pirrotta makes his directorial feature debut with a film based on a horrific news story, following a group of people bereft of hope and their descent into hell

What’s even more shocking than the existence of a criminal gang that smashes people’s bones just to cash in the insurance money is the fact that there are actually people out there prepared to have their bones shattered just to get their hands on a cut of said money. Reality is stranger than fiction in the first directorial feature by actor, director and playwright Vincenzo Pirrotta (We Believed [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Mario Martone
interview: Mario Martone
film profile], Romulus & Remus – The First King [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], The Traitor [+see also:
film review
trailer
Q&A: Marco Bellocchio
film profile] are some of the films he has performed in, while he is soon to be among the cast of the new Italian series The Bad Guy, on Prime Video). Presented in the 19^th Giornate degli Autori at the 79^th Venice Film Festival, in Venetian Nights, The Bone Breakers [+see also:
trailer
interview: Vincenzo Pirrotta
film profile] is a bleak descent into the abyss of human desperation, which draws its inspiration from a news story that defies belief, and which led to 11 arrests in 2018: in Palermo, a gang of criminals faked car crashes to defraud the insurance companies, and in order to obtain higher payouts, they broke the arms and legs of consenting victims. The latter were “recruited” from among the city’s down-and-outs, but there was certainly no lack of volunteers willing to have their bones broken for even the most trivial reasons.

Pirrotta catapults us into the horror right from the first few minutes: a group of men in an abandoned warehouse load gym weights into a trolley bag, which they then drop from the top of some scaffolding straight onto the outstretched arm of today’s victim, after having numbed it with ice. You can’t help but squirm in your seat as you watch the action unfold on the screen. This is how we discover the existence of this organisation of “bone breakers”, with clearly defined roles: Vincenzo (Pirrotta) brings in the victims in exchange for a small cut; Francesco (Ninni Bruschetta) stages the faked accidents and recruits bogus witnesses; Michele (Giovanni Calcagno) takes care of the bureaucracy and paperwork for the insurance companies; and Fasulina (Maziar Firouzi) is the actual perpetrator of the fractures.

Vincenzo, the main character, is tough without being ruthless. One of the most recently injured men, Machinetta (an unrecognisable Luigi Lo Cascio), blackmails him: he’s only willing to sign the insurance claim if they give him more money. Vincenzo is unable to impose his authority on this disobedient “client”, and for this reason, the gang casts him out. Meanwhile, Vincenzo becomes more and more attached to a young drug addict, Luisa (Selene Caramazza), a fragile and lonely girl whom the man starts to care for in his home. In him, she sees a chance for redemption, and love seems to blossom between the couple, but their future is nothing but a black hole: “We’re two people with zero talent; we’re nobodies mixed with nothingness,” she’s told by Vincenzo, who is now no longer collecting his cut and is strapped for cash. He has to find someone to smash up as soon as possible, and so (as suggested by his beloved but deceitful mother, played by Aurora Quattrocchi) he asks Luisa to offer up her arm for the next scam. The request is as monstrous as the dilemma (of whether or not to accept) is excruciating.

What this film slickly portrays is a hell inhabited by miserable people willing to mutilate themselves for almost no money, bringing to light a sinister part of Palermo’s outskirts that is even murkier than the mafia tales we’ve seen so often on the big screen. The news story is a strong starting point to jump off from, with the film subsequently digging into the characters’ (dark) souls. “How much are we willing to maim ourselves to get what we want?” is the question asked by the director, who also penned the screenplay alongside Ignazio Rosato and duo Salvo Ficarra and Valentino Picone (better known for their comedies; they are the writers of and actors in L’ora legale [+see also:
trailer
making of
film profile], among other titles). Also among the cast are Filippo Luna, playing Mimmo, a doting father and family guy who has his bones smashed to smithereens so that his daughter will want for nothing, subsequently suffering the dire consequences of his actions; and Simona Malato in the role of Maria, Francesco’s wife, who is the only person who feels any sympathy for these damned souls (and broken bodies) whom she finds herself having to care for in her own home.

The Bone Breakers was produced by Tramp Limited together with Rai Cinema. Its international sales have been entrusted to True Colours.

(Translated from Italian)

Photogallery 06/09/2022: Venice 2022 - The Bone Breakers

18 pictures available. Swipe left or right to see them all.

{0} of {1}

Vincenzo Pirrotta, Aurora Quattrocchi, Luigi Lo Cascio, Antonino "Ninni" Bruschetta, Selene Caramazza
© 2022 Fabrizio de Gennaro for Cineuropa - fadege.it, @fadege.it