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Irish Times
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
The Kingdom review: Riveting, quietly devastating crime saga reinvigorates the Mafia movie
The Kingdom Director : Julien Colonna Cert : None Genre : Crime Starring : Ghjuvanna Benedetti, Saveriu Santucci, Anthony Morganti, Andrea Cossu, Frédéric Poggi Running Time : 1 hr 48 mins Lesia, the 15-year-old heroine of Julien Colonna's riveting crime saga, is hoping to go on a date with Fabien, a local shop boy, when she is instead deposited in a safehouse with her dad. 'Nobody tells me anything,' she pouts. The teenager, played with arresting naturalism by the newcomer Ghjuvanna Benedetti, is perennially met with silence or deflection as she slowly realises the extent of her family's lawlessness. Set against the volatile backdrop of 1990s Corsica, this taut, quietly devastating film subverts the swagger of mob patriarchs or muscle-bound enforcers. Colonna, who is also its writer, gives us the adolescent daughter of a reclusive gang leader whose summer holiday takes a dark detour when she's abruptly delivered to her father's hideout. Lesia's journey from a flirtatious, curious adolescent to someone caught in the moral quicksand of her father's world unfolds as a series of violent television news reports, newspaper cuttings and overheard conversations about car bombs. Sneaking around the morgue earns Lesia a horrific glimpse of her late godfather's decimated head. READ MORE Pierre-Paul (Saveriu Santucci), her father, has long been an ambiguous, occasional presence in her life: a fugitive and feared mobster to most, he's a tender idol to his daughter, a tactile, protective dad who teaches her how to make fish soup or criticises her driving skills. [ Bring Her Back director Danny Philippou: 'I love the psycho-biddy genre. It allows actors to really play' Opens in new window ] During a heartfelt daddy-daughter exchange, he laments his failings as a father, shortcomings demanded by the cycle of violence that characterises his life. 'No, I can't be by your side at your mother's deathbed,' he says. Their bond, strained by absence and secrecy, is intensified under siege as a mob war heats up. As tensions and paranoia spiral, so too does Lesia's understanding of what it means to live in the orbit of criminality and retribution. The ominous, sun-drenched Corsican landscape mirrors the uneasiness of every interaction. For all the familial complications on screen, The Kingdom neither mythologises nor tempers the Mafia. Violence is used sparingly, yet it lingers in the margins of everyday mob dinners, boar hunts and bulletproof vests. The tragic cycle is composed of the same beats that defined such superior films as The Godfather and Animal Kingdom . But the tight focus on Lesia, and her realisation that the men she loves are also capable of monstrous things, reinvigorates the familiar form.
The Guardian
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Kingdom review – an intensely exciting and absorbing mob drama
There are fierce and overwhelmingly authentic performances here from first-timers in Julien Colonna's terrific mob drama. The setting is Corsica, around the 1990s, in the coastal region of Ajaccio, famously the home of Napoleon. Lesia (played by nonprofessional Ghjuvanna Benedetti) is a moody 15-year-old girl living with her aunt, hanging out with her friends and boisterous extended family of cousins. School is out for the summer and Lesia appears to be getting into a romance with a local boy. Maybe because of this, or due to other reasons, she is ordered to leave her aunt's house and go to the luxurious and fortified family compound of her widowed father. This is mob boss Pierre-Paul (superbly played by Saveriu Santucci), a heavy-set, slow-moving but intimidating patriarch who is perhaps displeased with her behaviour, but also gruffly tender and indulgent. Lesia soon senses that her dad and his consiglieri are discussing a recent attempted hit on his life, and the need for payback. At first, Lesia had been pining to go back home to her aunt, but soon she is thrilled to be an intimate witness, daughter and lieutenant to her father. Perhaps like Mary Corleone or Meadow Soprano, Lesia has an intense awareness of her own blueblood status and her father's importance in the world, as well as his importance to her personally. She has, of course, long forgotten about her crush on that callow boy: her father is the real man in her life. The performances of Benedetti and Santucci in the long and intimate dialogue scenes that Colonna gives them are really outstanding, as Pierre-Paul sadly explains the endless cycle of revenge that is now his life, and which began when he had to avenge his father's death more than three decades previously: 'A young man's anger … all human history is based on it.' We know what's coming, of course, but the film shows that something in its very inevitability is shocking. An intensely atmospheric, absorbing and exciting drama. The Kingdom is in UK and Irish cinemas from 8 August
The Guardian
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Kingdom review – an intensely exciting and absorbing mob drama
There are fierce and overwhelmingly authentic performances here from first-timers in Julien Colonna's terrific mob drama. The setting is Corsica, around the 1990s, in the coastal region of Ajaccio, famously the home of Napoleon. Lesia (played by nonprofessional Ghjuvanna Benedetti) is a moody 15-year-old girl living with her aunt, hanging out with her friends and boisterous extended family of cousins. School is out for the summer and Lesia appears to be getting into a romance with a local boy. Maybe because of this, or due to other reasons, she is ordered to leave her aunt's house and go to the luxurious and fortified family compound of her widowed father. This is mob boss Pierre-Paul (superbly played by Saveriu Santucci), a heavy-set, slow-moving but intimidating patriarch who is perhaps displeased with her behaviour, but also gruffly tender and indulgent. Lesia soon senses that her dad and his consiglieri are discussing a recent attempted hit on his life, and the need for payback. At first, Lesia had been pining to go back home to her aunt, but soon she is thrilled to be an intimate witness, daughter and lieutenant to her father. Perhaps like Mary Corleone or Meadow Soprano, Lesia has an intense awareness of her own blueblood status and her father's importance in the world, as well as his importance to her personally. She has, of course, long forgotten about her crush on that callow boy: her father is the real man in her life. The performances of Benedetti and Santucci in the long and intimate dialogue scenes that Colonna gives them are really outstanding, as Pierre-Paul sadly explains the endless cycle of revenge that is now his life, and which began when he had to avenge his father's death more than three decades previously: 'A young man's anger … all human history is based on it.' We know what's coming, of course, but the film shows that something in its very inevitability is shocking. An intensely atmospheric, absorbing and exciting drama. The Kingdom is in UK and Irish cinemas from 8 August
