Sailing Home, or the Italian title, “Tornando A Casa” is one of the films showing at The 8th European Union Film Festival 2007.
Franco in Tornando A Casa a.k.a. Sailing Home
The film is about a four-man team of lower-class fishermen who struggle to make ends meet: Salvatore (Salvatore Iaccarino), the decent, determined leader; Giovanni (Giovanni Iaccarino), the ship’s stubborn owner; Samir (Azouz Abdelaziz), a kindhearted Arabian immigrant; and Franco (Aniello Scotto D’Antuono), an expressive youth who is in love with Rosa (Roberta Papa), a beautiful schoolteacher. Hoping for a bigger catch, Salvatore illegally leads his crew into the territorial waters of Tunisia, risking arrest and possible death. After a close encounter with the police they return home, yet their homecoming only brings new problems.
Back in Naples, Salvatore has to deal with the Camorra and local fishermen who are not happy that he has come back.
Franco, the youngest of the group, wants to try his luck in America with his fiancée Rosa but as Rosa is accidentally killed by a young school children, Franco’s American dream is shattered. He becomes lost and though he has come back and join Salvatore’s crew, they all thought he has died when Franco has attempted to rescue someone drowning in the sea. Instead, Franco is still alive and is picked up by a boat of African immigrants. He has now a new identity.
Director Vincenzo Marra who won the award for Best First Film in the Critics’ Week of the 2001 Venice Film Festival for this moving look at the lives of a group of Neapolitan fishermen.
Marra’s straightforward approach to his material adds emotional depth to the story. His decision to cast actual fisherman who had no prior acting experience is another gamble that pays off. Like most Italian films, Sailing Home breathes with an air of simplicity that is direct, sincere, and deeply affecting.
My rating: 7 out of 10 for an independent film that use real fishermen who has no prior acting experience.
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