Migrant Anxieties: Italian Cinema in a Transnational Frame by Áine O’Healy

Abstract

Reviewed by: Migrant Anxieties: Italian Cinema in a Transnational Frame by Áine O’Healy Caterina Scarabicchi Migrant Anxieties: Italian Cinema in a Transnational Frame. By Áine O’Healy. (New Directions in National Cinemas) Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 2019. x+268 pp. $32. ISBN 978–0–253–03718–3. Migrant Anxieties is a compelling, up-to-date analysis of Italian migration cinema since the 1990s in a transnational perspective, under the critical lens of race, class, [End Page 131] gender, and nationality. It aims to decipher underlying anxieties and complexities in recent Italian films dealing with migration. In the Introduction, Áine O’Healy underlines how Italian cinema has an established role of nation-building. However, this aspect has recently been complicated by cinema’s tendency to become transnational, and therefore to trespass national boundaries and become part of a globalized cultural platform. This is even more the case for migrant cinema, in itself a problematic label. The main chapters then offer the reader an accurate examination of case studies, which are discussed from their conception to their reception by the public. The first chapter focuses on immigration from the Balkans in the 1990s, analysing films that reignite the debate on Italianness and its ‘others’. From a postcolonial perspective, the southern question and the notion of whiteness are identified as key tropes, especially in relation to the colonial and Fascist years. Moreover, the author aptly remarks that migrant characters in these films are often introduced as catalysts for the Italian protagonists’ life trajectories, such as in Amelio’s Lamerica (1994) and Moretti’s Aprile (1997). The following chapter looks at how gender intersects migration films, observing that in these narratives female characters tend to be reduced to mere bodies destined to care labour or sex work, thus denouncing, but also paradoxically reinforcing, the position of abjection and vulnerability of migrant women in Italian society. Chapter 3 explores the representation of non-white bodies on screen: Placido’s Pummarò (1990) is examined as a key example in which, by trying to reverse cultural stereotypes about African immigrants, filmic narratives can result in the creation of idealized, essentialized gazes on the migrant subject, who is almost unmistakably Orientalized and/or eroticized. This feature also emerges in O’Healy’s ironic analysis of Bertolucci’s L’assedio (1998). Furthermore, O’Healy observes that the impossibility of a positive encounter between Italians and migrants is frequently and symbolically condensed in the death, disappearance, or forced removal of the latter towards the end of the film. The following chapter investigates the maturation of young men in Italian peripheries, induced by the encounter with a struggling migrant character, and the ethical questions prompted by the witnessing of exploitation and discrimination. Here, too, the author remarks that the narrative focus tends to privilege the moral evolution of the Italian protagonist rather than the migrant one, such as in the case of Quando sei nato non puoi più nasconderti (2005) by Giordana. In the fifth chapter, the author provides new insights regarding two major migration narratives: Crialese’s Terraferma (2011) and Rosi’s Fuocoammare (2016), which deal with the characters’ witnessing of the arrival of refugees on Italy’s southern coasts. Building on the critical concept of borderscape, she also investigates the dynamics of inclusion and exclusion generated in the border area of the Mediterranean Sea, as represented in recent films. O’Healy remarks that, despite the compelling accomplishment of both films in terms of cinematography, migrants often remain in the role of voiceless, victimized figures in the background. Another danger is identified in the risk of idealizing not only black bodies, but also [End Page 132] Italy’s South. She then concludes with a brief analysis of Segre’s L’ordine delle cose (2017), observing that, unlike the other films discussed in the chapter, it offers no consolatory gestures of solidarity on the part of the Italian character portrayed. Chapter 6 reflects on multiethnic cohabitations in contemporary Italy, and on the influences of comedy and drama on Italian migration cinema. In particular, the author discusses the rise of global melodrama, which highlights the state of anxiety experienced by hosting countries burdened by an unresolved relationship with their colonial...