Review of Gomorrah (2008) by Jake W — 04 Sep 2009

The most common argument against the crime movie genre is that it tends to glamorize the criminal lifestyle. This argument is most commonly used against films about organized crime syndicates. This argument does not apply to ?Gomorrah.? Never has a movie made the life of a criminal seem so depressing and unappealing. You will not find the glorification of ?Scarface,? nor the romanticism of ?The Godfather? anywhere in this masterpiece of a crime saga from Italian director Matteo Garrone.

Typically, organized crime movies follow a basic rise and fall formula. An ambitious outsider or headstrong hood works his way to the top before he meats his bloody end. The key difference in ?Gomorrah? is that there?s no rising, only falling. It tells five interwoven stories about relative outsiders who, in one way or another, become involved with the Camorra, a deadly crime organization based in Naples.

One story is about Toto, a young boy who gets a job making deliveries for his neighborhood clan. This story shows the seductive pull of the Camorra, slightly similar to Scorsese?s portrayal of the American Mob in ?Goodfellas,? just not as glamorous. Toto just wants to have some money of his own, but as he gets deeper into the ?family? his life is changed forever. There?s a heartbreaking scene in which he tells his best friend that they can no longer be friends because they?ve become members of rival clans.

Another is the story of Pasquale, a fashion designer contracted by a Camorra boss. He takes a payoff from a Chinese business man to teach his designs to the workers in a factory. The Chinese are so afraid of reprisal that they ask Pasquale to ride in the trunk of the car on their way to the factory. This story ends with a television broadcast showing Scarlett Johansson walking a red carpet in a beautiful dress, and we realize that the Camorra has a farther reach than just Naples and the surrounding area.

A third story features Marco and Ciro, two foolhardy wannabe gangsters who quote famous lines from ?Scarface? and dream of grabbing the world by the balls, Tony Montana style. They don?t want to join any one faction, they think they can carve their own path and be their own bosses. Unfortunately, the code of the land says that if you?re not with us, you?re against us. They effectively make enemies of everybody they come in contact with. To say that Marco and Ciro are the two most actively self destructive movie characters since Robert De Niro burst onto the scene as Johnny Boy in ?Mean Streets? might be an understatement.

The remaining two stories involve money runner named Don Ciro, who is caught in the middle of two warring factions, and a young man named Roberto, who must deal with the moral implications of his job handling less-than-legal toxic waste management.

If you want your gangster movies to feature bold, operatic drama, or Shakespearian power struggles look elsewhere. ?Gomorrah? feels more like a documentary than a fictional film. (No, it?s not shot ?mockumentary? style.) The characters just go about their illegal activities as if they were working in a cubicle 9 to 5, until their routine is broken up by sudden, unexpected, and shocking bursts of extreme violence. This is a cold, unflinching portrayal of cold, unflinching criminals. It?s also a movie I won?t soon forget.