Parky at the Pictures (In Cinemas 20/2/2014)

Among the items on offer are Vincenzo Marra's Il gemello/The Triplet, which examines the relationships between life Gennaro, cellmate Raffaele (who has been inside since he was 15) and Niko, the boss of the infamous Secondigliano prison in Naples; Giuseppe Schillaci's Apolitics Now!, which presents a bitingly ironic and deeply disconcerting record of the May 2012 mayoral election in the Sicilian city of Palermo, in which the 12 candidates struggled to find consensus at a time of financial instability and political chaos while boosting their own profiles through a series of bizarre meetings and stunt events; Stefano Liberti and Andrea Segre's Mare chiuso/Closed Sea, which draws on harrowing personal testimonies to expose the pact between Muammar Gadaffi and Silvio Berlusconi that saw over 2000 African migrants captured on the Mediterranean between May 2009 and September 2010 and returned to Libya, where they were subjected to unspeakable torture in a flagrant abuse of human rights; Maged El-Mahedy's I Don't Speak Very Good, I Dance Better, which chronicles the director's experiences in Tahrir Square when he returns to Egypt to take care of a sister suffering from hepatitis and reveals some unexpected truths about the Arab Spring; and Alessio Genovese's L'ultima frontiera/EU 013, The Last Frontier, which sees cameras enter the Identification and Expulsion Centre for the first time to record the conditions that thousands of foreign citizens have to endure each year as they try to establish their identity and make a fresh start.

The dispossessed are very much to the fore in Marco Bertozzi's Profughi a Cinecittà/Refugees in Cinecittà, which examines the role played during the Second World War by the legendary film studio outside Rome, as it served first as an Axis camp for deportees and then as an Allied billet for displaced persons awaiting a return to what was left of their homes. Based on research by Noa Steimatsky, this is a harrowing secret history of an iconic place of artistic endeavour that helps explain why neo-realists like Roberto Rossellini and Vittorio De Sica were forced (regardless of any aesthetic or ideological concerns) to shoot on the streets, in natural light with inexperienced casts.

The Nazis commandeered Cinecittà after they had rounded up 947 men from the nearby. Quadraro quarter on 16 October 1943. After the prisoners had been sent to concentration camps, the studios were looted and 16 trucks carried contraband to the outlying Salò Republic and beyond to the Third Reich. Early in the new year, the Allies started bombing the Eternal City for the first time and the complex was deemed a legitimate target. However, on 6 June 1944, it was requisitioned by the Allied Control Commission and the dream factory became a living nightmare for thousands of men, women and children.

Ironically, few visual records survive of life inside Cinecittà in this period, although Jack Salvatori set part of his love story Umanità/Humanity (1946) on Stage 5, which would later become home to Federico Fellini, who lay in state there after his death in October 1993. Sculptor Adriano De Angelis, who would spend over half a century at the studio making scenery, returns to the soundstage with sisters Mirella and Bruna Ostrini and Klara and Moshe Wollmanm, who first met there seven decades earlier. They exchange photographs and ID cards and reminisce about the crowded conditions, food shortages and constant sense of apprehension.

While film magazines carried advertisements seeking donations for the Children of Cinecittà and orphans begged for help in newsreels, life was rather exciting for siblings Katrin and Sasha Tenenbaum, whose parents were a doctor and nurse helping to care for the refugees in the International Camp run by UNRRA. They attended the same school as the Jewish children and homeless locals like  Angelo Iacono (who went on to become Dario Argento's producer) and Rocco Tedeschi, who recognises his mother, sister and future brother-in-law in a surviving clip. They recall how their emaciated look made them useful to film-makers, who cast them as extras in stories depicting real life. Yet, in her narration, Steimatsky questions why the neo-realists kept away from Cinecittà, which only started to get back to normal in 1948

Around 5000 were sheltering in the studio as the war ended and those looking back have mixed memories. While some fondly recall the film shows that boosted morale, others remember being unable to afford the price of admission. Similarly, while some hark back to the sense of freedom, others lament that girls from the camp were considered `easy', especislly if they fraternised with Allied troops. Even charitable gestures divided opinion, with the sequence in Umanità, in which donated clothes were shared out, was cut into the propaganda documentary Thanks, America (1948), in a bid to remind Italians of the debt they owed to their liberators and not the Communist Party.

Having been raised in Tripoli, Flora and Iole Mezzavilla felt little gratitude to Italy for dragging their family into a war that caused them to flee Libya. Yet, while they were keen to return south as soon as peace was declared, they both eventually settled in the homeland their parents had left behind. By then, Italian cinema was lauded worldwide. But, Admiral Ellery Stone, the Chief of the Allied Control Commission, insisted that a predominantly agricultural country had no need of a film industry, especially one that had been established by the Fascists. So, he kept Cinecittà closed for as long as possible and it was only reclaimed in 1948 by Giulio Andreotti, who was keen to use film to put a positive spin on Italy's recovery. He put a tax on Hollywood films to help fund local pictures, although he tried to outlaw neo-realism because of its unpalatable truths. Moreover, he froze foreign assets so that American companies had resort to `runaway'  productions in order to access their capital. Among the most prestigious was Mervyn LeRoy's Quo Vadis? (1951), which featured numerous refugees in the crowd sequences, as the International Camp remained open until 1950. Indeed, Bruna and Mirella found themselves being profiled for a Luce documentary about their return to Africa and they recall with little affection how they were herded to Naples and made to wave for the camera as their boat sailed

Following mottled footage of the burning of Rome in Enzo Guazzoni's 1913 version of Henryk Sienkiewicz's novel, we see a trailer for MGM's epic, complete with its 30,000 extras. Iacono and Tedeschi wander through the backlot and see some of statuary stored there. The latter recalls breaking his foot in a fall off a plaster balcony and how he was relocated to a sink estate outside Rome. Others dispersed across Europe or emigrated to Israel or the United States. But few ever forgot their experiences in the all-too-real neverland that Benito Mussolini had founded in 1937 to reflect his glory.

An equally remarkable tale of indomitability is related by Costanza Quatriglio in Terramatta: Il Novecento italiano di Vincenzo Rabito analfabeta siciliano/Terramatta: The Italian Twentieth Century of Vincenzo Rabito, Sicilian Illiterate. Alternating between shots of typed words, archive footage and modest recreations, this fine film not only reveals how an ordinary man invented his own language in order to record his daily experiences in thousands of tightly written journal pages, but also how his sons discovered his writing, had it published under the title Terra Matta and saw it win top prize at the annual contest organised in the fabled `City of Diaries', Pieve Santo Stefano.

Vincenzo Rabito was born in Via Corsica in Chiaramonte Gulfi to Salvatore and Salvatrice Gurrieri on 31 March 1899. His father died when he was still small, leaving his mother to raise four boys and three girls. In his journals, Vincenzo (voiced by Roberto Nobile) blamed God for taking his father for trying to stay honest and for making him leave school at the age of seven to make money to feed his siblings and mother, who always prayed that he would be rewarded for his selfless devotion as a boy.

On 24 May 1915, Italy entered the Great War and Vincenzo recalls how the whole town was celebrating carnival and he was relishing tucking into pasta and pork lard when the recruiting officer said he was old enough to enlist and he marched away through the cheering crowds to eight lorries waiting in the square. He feared he would never see Palermo again and, against footage of train stations, munitions factories and the trenches, Vincenzo explains how he was trained as a sapper and was initially detailed to bury bodies. Before long, however, he was sent into the frontline against the Austrians and wondered why they were being sent to die like dogs. By 28 October, though, Vincenzo was certain he had killed fellow humans and was horrified at the prospect he was becoming a butcher. But he survived and, as images show soldiers being decorated for their bravery, he remembers the relief of getting home in one piece.

At one point, he was billeted in the small town of Planina and lived with a woman who tried to marry him off to her plain niece, Francesca, who did his laundry and let him fondle her. However, she got jealous when he chatted to another girl at a dance and, when he was sent to Gorizia for supplies, Francesca convinced herself that he had abandoned her and coaxed her aunt into trashing his room and throwing his belongings into the street. In order to teach her a lesson, Vincenzo and his electrician friend used a battery to give her electric shocks between her legs. But, when she complained to HQ, his superiors threatened to shoot her as a traitor rather than believe her accusation.

Civilian life proved every bit as wretched, however, as he came from a long line of socialists and he had no truck with Mussolini's bombastic claims that Italy was about to become the centre of civilisation for the third time in its history. Yet, while he quickly discovered that the best jobs were given to members of the Fascist Party, it didn't dawn on him until he was on a troop ship bound for Abyssinia that the bigwig who came to Regalbuto promising to help him fulfil his ambition of working in Africa had any ulterior motives. But, as always, Vincenzo adapted to life in Ogaden and began growing his own vegetables in the rich soil. Indeed, it was only when he returned home to share a tuna supper with his mother and sister on 5 October 1939 that he realised he had been away so long.

Being back in the bosom of his family had its drawbacks, however, as Vincenzo's mother persuaded him to take a wife and, according to his records, 30 years of misery began on 24 January 1940. He wasn't home long, though, as he was sent to Germany to work in the Rhineland coal mines and it was here that he learned he was the father of a baby boy named Turiddu. Over footage of Cologne bomb sites, Vincenzo vows to take a toy puppy home with him so he could have a cut photo for his wallet and Quatriglio lets his camera linger on the tattered snapshot that has survived to this day.

Eventually, Vincenzo walked home and, while working on a baron's estate, he survived for a spell in a cave dug into the soft rock as the Axis and Allies battled for the surrounding countryside. A natural storyteller, he enjoyed recounting his exploits and remembers how the cave felt like a theatre as he held his audience captive. He also notes the birth of his second son, Tanuzzo, on 23 September 1943, and his relief that he has survived another global conflict and hoped that this would be the last. But, even after he returned to Sicily, he was far from certain that peace would be permanent, as the Cold War simmered and he threw in his lot with the Communists, as being a Party member was the only way to get work. He hoped to become a roadman, as it was such a secure occupation. Therefore, he was delighted when, on 18 January 1945, he  was set to work on the Chiaramonte-Monterosso highway and continued to enjoy the freedom of the open road for many years, making friends with the farmers who stopped him to chat and kept him in ricotta cheese.

There were disappointments, however, such as when the Catholic Church allied with the Christian Democrats and ensured a bunch of superstitious women kept the Communists out of power. Yet, such was his desire for a quiet life that Vincenzo put up posters for all the parties in his roadhouse and everyone regarded him as a well-balanced fellow. He also mourned the death of his 77 year-old mother, although he enjoyed the fact she snapped at him that she was not helpless when he tried to waft away flies and sent him home to his pregnant wife. She died on 29 May 1949 and Giovanni was born on 25 July and we see Tano and Giovanni greeting Turi as he descends from the bus and they drive out to the old family home and elderly neighbour Mrs Melia tells them all about the day a plaque was unveiled in their father's honour.

A 1954 ordinance that all provincial roads had to be kept paved kept Vincenzo in work and he was able to put all three sons through school. Indeed, he felt their exam success was God's way of paying him back for his own tough childhood. The siblings recall the working men's club getting a television set and their mother sending them to keep the best seats. She disliked sitting with her neighbours, however, and enjoyed lauding it over them when she got her own TV and used to get the boys to sit in their underwear to clear out the stragglers at the end of an evening's viewing.

Vincenzo was frustrated at never getting a promotion, but he almost burst with pride when Turi graduated as an engineer in 1966. Yet, he had his own educational achievement, as he passed the primary school certificate with the help of the local teacher when he was in his thirties and this enabled him to start tapping away on his Olivetti typewriter early in the mornings before anyone else was up. The boys remember it began as a memoir, but gradually became a diary, whose closing words gave thanks for the fact that his sons loved each other.

As they watch home-movie footage, we see Vincenzo and his wife (who is never named) eating cake and revelling in being with their children. Tano became a land surveyor and Giovanni went to university in Bologna. While he was there, Vincenzo received a grant from the First World War veterans association to visit the battlefields and he made a point of calling in on his son en route. Together, they returned to the River Isonzo that he had last seen 52 years earlier filled with corpses. That night, unable to sleep in a comfortable bed in a place he associated with cold, hunger, fleas and fear, he had thought about how hard his mother had slogged to raise him and how angry she had been when he came home without food or money. But he consoles himself that he did enough to send his sister to school and her notebook prompted him to teach himself to read and write. From such humble beginnings, a literary masterpiece was born and Vincenzo's relief that his sons live in easier times provides a fitting finale to a witty, poignant, personal and charmingly down-to-earth narrative, that is adroitly counterpointed by images edited with evident reverence by Letizia Caudullo.

The crosscut contrasts achieved by Roberta Cruciani and Paolo Petrucci prove equally crucial to Agostino Ferrente and Giovanni Piperno's Le cose belle/Beautiful Things, as it sees how the life has treated the four Neopolitan kids they first encountered in 1999 and how far they have gone to living their dreams. There is a myth in Naples that time doesn't exist, as one minute you are waiting, the next you're remembering. This variation on Michael Apted's 7 Up format more than proves the point and it will be intriguing to see if Cruciani and Petrucci continue to keep tabs on Fabio Rippa, Adele Serra, Silvana Sorbetti and Enzo Della Volpe in the coming years.

Back in 1999, Adele was 14 and cheeky at school. She lives with her pastry seller father Antonio, mother Carmela, older sister Jessica and baby brother Emanuele. As night falls, she zooms around the city on a boy's Vespa with her best friend.  Adele dances in a bikini around a pole in what looks like an amusement arcade. She also interviews her mother, who admits she is disappointed with the way she has turned out and wishes she wasn't as aggressive as her sister. Yet, they all sing happily together in the back of the car as they pay a visit to their auntie.

Fabio is every bit as garrulous and he chirps up from a gaggle of street kids discussing a recent car bombing. His mother, Rosario, is the only woman at the fish market and he is enormously proud of her, as she banters with the blokes and takes no nonsense from any of them. He helps her set up her street stall and cheekily interviews a beat cop and teases him for being useless when he admits he has never shot a serial killer or arrested anyone famous. Also aged 14, Silvana lives with her bricklayer father Giuseppe and sister Concetta. They sing to the radio and ask Giuseppe about having his tattoos removed with acid. She claims she wants to be a virgin when she marries and insists she doesn't miss her mother, Vincenza. But she pays her a visit and they agree it is important to have a female role model, as lots of younger children scurry around them.

Enzo is also something of a traditionalist, as he loves listening to classical Italian singers and regularly performs in restaurants with his guitarist father, Alfredo. He doesn't really like Naples and is hardly surprised when he revisits his old neighbourhood and nobody recognises him. A small boy stands next to him, as he sings in the street and Enzo pushes him away because he doesn't want to share his moment in the spotlight. Ironically, he complains that people are unfriendly and looks very much a stranger in a strange land, especially when he tries to flirt with Marinella and she dismisses his chat-up lines about romantic ballads by saying she prefers modern pop by foreign bands.

At this point, we fast forward 12 years and Enzo is going door to door selling subscriptions to the Tele 2 phone company, while Silvana has a teddy bear tattoo on her shoulder and is caring for her mother, who is about to go into hospital for some tests. Fabio also lives at home, even though he has a child with his girlfriend, and jokes with his mates as they watch a protestor being taken down from a statue. Adele also has a daughter and she works in a chipshop, while Jessica has made it as a model and has an active online presence.

One of Silvana's brothers has run away from home and landed himself in prison and she consults a lawyer about having him released into house arrest. However, as Silvana and Vincenza were arrested for breaking the nose of a plain-clothes policeman on a bus, the lawyer doesn't hold out much hope and she is disappointed, as her fiancé of 10 years was released under the same conditions. Enzo is also courting, a Nigerian named Eva, who seems to like him, but seems shy around the camera. He tells her he enjoys his work, but times are hard and people tend to stick to what they know.

Adele has another job as a hotel maid and she jokes to a workmate that Jessica had lots of plastic surgery to improve her looks. But she is not afraid to flaunt her body herself, as she dances at a pole club and a quick flashback of her playing as a kid suddenly seems very sad. But Adele seems to bear Jessica no malice and accepts her lot. Enzo also seems on an even keel and he is genuinely upset when Fabio's mother says he hasn't really recovered from the loss of his brother, who went out one night and never returned. Silvana spends a lot of time babysitting her half-siblings and she tells a younger sister who has started sleeping with her boyfriend to be careful and reassures her that their mother will be fine at the hospital.

The crosscut contrasts achieved by Roberta Cruciani and Paolo Petrucci prove equally crucial to Agostino Ferrente and Giovanni Piperno's Le cose belle/Beautiful Things, as it sees how the life has treated the four Neapolitan kids they first encountered in 1999 and how far they have gone to living their dreams. There is a myth in Naples that time doesn't exist, as one minute you are waiting, the next you're remembering. This variation on Michael Apted's 7 Up format more than proves the point and it will be intriguing to see if Cruciani and Petrucci continue to keep tabs on Fabio Rippa, Adele Serra, Silvana Sorbetti and Enzo Della Volpe in the coming years.

Back in 1999, Adele was 14 and cheeky at school. She lives with her pastry seller father Antonio, mother Carmela, older sister Jessica and baby brother Emanuele. As night falls, she zooms around the city on a boy's Vespa with her best friend.  Adele dances in a bikini around a pole in what looks like an amusement arcade. She also interviews her mother, who admits she is disappointed with the way she has turned out and wishes she wasn't as aggressive as her sister. Yet, they all sing happily together in the back of the car as they pay a visit to their auntie.

Fabio is every bit as garrulous and he chirps up from a gaggle of street kids discussing a recent car bombing. His mother, Rosario, is the only woman at the fish market and he is enormously proud of her, as she banters with the blokes and takes no nonsense from any of them. He helps her set up her street stall and cheekily interviews a beat cop and teases him for being useless when he admits he has never shot a serial killer or arrested anyone famous. Also aged 14, Silvana lives with her bricklayer father Giuseppe and sister Concetta. They sing to the radio and ask Giuseppe about having his tattoos removed with acid. She claims she wants to be a virgin when she marries and insists she doesn't miss her mother, Vincenza. But she pays her a visit and they agree it is important to have a female role model, as lots of younger children scurry around them.

Enzo is also something of a traditionalist, as he loves listening to classical Italian singers and regularly performs in restaurants with his guitarist father, Alfredo. He doesn't really like Naples and is hardly surprised when he revisits his old neighbourhood and nobody recognises him. A small boy stands next to him, as he sings in the street and Enzo pushes him away because he doesn't want to share his moment in the spotlight. Ironically, he complains that people are unfriendly and looks very much a stranger in a strange land, especially when he tries to flirt with Marinella and she dismisses his chat-up lines about romantic ballads by saying she prefers modern pop by foreign bands.

At this point, we fast forward 12 years and Enzo is going door to door selling subscriptions to the Tele 2 phone company, while Silvana has a teddy bear tattoo on her shoulder and is caring for her mother, who is about to go into hospital for some tests. Fabio also lives at home, even though he has a child with his girlfriend, and jokes with his mates as they watch a protester being taken down from a statue. Adele also has a daughter and she works in a chip shop, while Jessica has made it as a model and has an active online presence.

One of Silvana's brothers has run away from home and landed himself in prison and she consults a lawyer about having him released into house arrest. However, as Silvana and Vincenza were arrested for breaking the nose of a plainclothes policeman on a bus, the lawyer doesn't hold out much hope and she is disappointed, as her fiancé of 10 years was released under the same conditions. Enzo is also courting, a Nigerian named Eva, who seems to like him, but seems shy around the camera. He tells her he enjoys his work, but times are hard and people tend to stick to what they know.

Adele has another job as a hotel maid and she jokes to a workmate that Jessica had lots of plastic surgery to improve her looks. But she is not afraid to flaunt her body herself, as she dances at a pole club and a quick flashback of her playing as a kid suddenly seems very sad. But Adele seems to bear Jessica no malice and accepts her lot. Enzo also seems on an even keel and he is genuinely upset when Fabio's mother says he hasn't really recovered from the loss of his brother, who went out one night and never returned. Silvana spends a lot of time babysitting her half-siblings and she tells a younger sister who has started sleeping with her boyfriend to be careful and reassures her that their mother will be fine at the hospital. She also goes to visit her brother in jail and admits on the phone to her boyfriend that she is frazzled.

Enzo gets Fabio a trial with Tele 2 and the rookie immediately informs his friend that his delivery is too fast and technical for people to follow. Moreover, Fabio trudges a long way behind Enzo as they schlepp through tenements where seemingly nobody has faith in their product. Yet, they chat amicably enough when they stop for an ice cream and Fabio tells Enzo his bosses exploit his good nature. He is on edge at a family gathering, as he has decided to tell Alfredo he is dating a black woman, but his father is unconcerned and hopes they will be happy.

Relations between Adele and Carmela are markedly less cosy and they have a blazing row about favouritism that ends with Adele insisting she may not be successful, but she does the best she can for her daughter. Harsh reality also keeps creeping up on Silvana, as she goes to try on a wedding dress, only to end the day scrubbing the back yard with her dog playfully getting in the way. Fabio is no closer to committing to his girlfriend, but, while they are having a nice day at the beach, Enzo gets dumped by Eva and he is left alone with a chicken. He tries to call her and ask if they can be friends, but she insists a complete break is best. Fabio always wanted to be a footballer, but he is now reduced to selling Napoli scarves on match days and his restorer father Ciro (whose home is full of budgies) says he is proud of him no matter what he does.

As the narrator opines that the best most societies can hope for is that the good outnumber the bad, we see Silvana start training as an Avon rep and the closing captions tell us that she hopes to join an uncle in the Netherlands when her fiancé is free, but will continue to care for her mother in the meantime. Adele is also back home, with her mother and brother, and has started cleaning private houses to ensure more regular hours. Fabio is engaged, too, but lost his job in a shoe factory and is now on trial making wallets. Completing the quartet of homebodies, Enzo is single and has been unemployed since Tele 2 left Naples due to poor trading. For once, the eternal optimist seems down, but bouncing back is the only option for those so close to the ground.

Cruciani and Petrucci claim that the `beautiful things' of the title `are not to be looked for nor in the future nor in the past, but in that particular present lived with the heart breaking; beauty of waiting, of uncertain living day by day, of the struggling for a decent existence: swimming sometimes against the current and sometimes letting oneself go'. Some may find this a touch patronising, but this follows the Apted template of letting the subject speak for themselves and, in showing there is more to Naples than the Camorra.