The Hand of God (2021)

My top film of 2021, Paolo Sorrentino’s mostly autobiographical tale of a teenage Fabietto Schisa (a wonderfully awkward Filippo Scotto) growing up in 1980’s Naples is his most personal film to date. Sorrentino recently claimed that his Oscar winning The Great Beauty (2013) could originally have been shot in Naples as oppose to Rome, but in the end the film became about Rome as much as the story itself, and Naples would have been difficult to film in. Sorrentino has always wanted to portray this tale, and he felt the time was right to finally put the cameras to work in his home city. The Hand Of God opens with a sumptuous tracking shot of Naples from out at sea, approaching the city across the water before focusing on a car driving along a coastal road. It’s impossible to be entirely sold on a film from its opening shot, but this was the closest I’d been in a long time. Thankfully Sorrentino backs up his initial promise with two hours of aching beauty, hilarity, and poignant tragedy as Fabietto faces the trials and tribulations of being a teenager in one of the most dangerous cities in Europe. His teenage years coincide with the arrival of Diego Maradona in Naples, a God-like figure whose presence in a city that revolves around the football team is akin to the second coming of Christ. Sorrentino attributes his life to Maradona after an incident halfway through the film where the footballer is indirectly responsible for saving the young director's life, hence the importance of the man being referenced in the films title. The film takes you all over the city, shot with such astonishing elegance by Daria D’Antonio as to make you wish you lived in Naples, despite constant reminders of the dangers abound. The film hit home on a personal level as Fabietto takes a trip to Capri with his friend Armando; I went to Capri on my honeymoon a few years ago, and to see places I’d been during such a trip for the first time since visiting, (eighteen months after my marriage had ended) was emotional to say the least. But Sorrentino immediately injects hope into hollowness, grief into laughter, in such impressive fashion, balancing the film on a knife-edge of sadness and laughter, but mostly leaning on fond childhood memories. The tone of adolescence in Naples is perfectly captured in the importance of family, religion and friends; Sorrentino makes it obvious how important all three were to him. Always in the background of salient moments in Sorrentino’s life is the presence of Diego Maradona. The implausibility of his potential transfer to Napoli is sold as a miracle when it happens, the arrival of a prophet to a city in dire need of one. Fabietto’s life changing moments are drawn in line with the actions of Maradona himself, up to a point anyway. The more Fabietto realises he wants to become a filmmaker (Fellini is referenced as making a film in Naples during The Hand Of God) the more it could be argued he starts to become his own man. The key to all of this comes about halfway through the film, and I don’t want to give anything away (despite this event being used in many synopsis I’ve read), because going in blind makes this all the more affecting. The Hand Of God might not be Sorrentino’s finest film in the critical sense of the word, but his ability to draw out such a personal tale and yet make you feel such a part of it as well as being able to extract your own personal comparisons in a strongly emotional fashion is an incredible achievement. 8.8/10