Io non ho paura
Tags: suspenseful, historical, storytelling

Plot synopsis:
The action of the film takes place in 1978, in a fictional town called Acqua Traverse in Southern Italy, during the hottest summer of the century and the infamous Years of Lead. A nine-year-old boy named Michele Amitrano and a group of his friends set out on a race across scorched wheat fields to a deserted farmhouse. Michele's sister tags along but falls over, breaking her glasses, and she calls out to Michele, who runs back to her. Michele quickly calms her worries about the glasses, and they continue running. They are the last of the group to arrive at the farmhouse, which means that she and Michele must pay a forfeit. However, the leader of the group, Skull, chooses the only girl in the group apart from Michele's sister to pay up instead. He instructs her to expose herself to the boys, and she looks to the others for help, but they refuse to meet her gaze. She reluctantly and hesitantly begins to take off her clothes, when Michele pipes up that he was the one to arrive last and he should be the one to pay.
As his punishment Michele walks the length of a beam, high up in a rickety old barn-like building at the deserted farmhouse, and after that the group is seen going home. As Michele and his sister set off, she asks him where her glasses are, and he goes back to fetch them. While searching for the glasses at the farmhouse, Michele discovers a hole in the ground covered with a sheet of metal. He opens it and sees part of a bare human leg; horrified, due to the limited time he had to investigate the situation, he decides to keep this a secret from the others. He feels threatened by Skull and doesn't want such a big discovery to be taken away from him. The next day, he returns to the place, throwing rocks at the leg. As he moves to pick up another rock, the camera pans to him, on the ground, searching around him in the dirt, where Michele finds another rock to throw. As the camera pans back into the hole, the leg is out of sight. Startled, Michele is suddenly staring down at a zombie-like young boy stumbling out of the darkness and into view. Terrified, Michele hurries home once more, but then his bicycle chain breaks and he is thrown off his bike. As he returns home he is scolded for being late. The next day while playing with friends Michele thinks about the boy and later he decides to visit the zombie-like boy again. Michele finds that the boy is actually alive, although he is very weak. He brings him water and later food. One day, Michele goes to buy bread, to feed the boy. On the way he sees the familiar face of Skull's older brother driving away from the house and thinks this may be the person who has imprisoned the boy. He returns home, making sure that his own presence is not discovered by whoever put the boy there.
Michele climbs down to collect the bread back from the boy. During this time Michele's undaunted curiosity leads him to begin questioning the confused, possibly delusional, and traumatized boy. To Michele's annoyance, the boy thinks he is dead and asks Michele if he is his guardian angel. The boy walks over to him and Michele sees him at his full size, as going crazy the boy cries out "I'm Dead"! He screams louder and louder, making Michele climb back up the rope quickly and return home.
One night, Michele sees his parents watching on the television news that a child named Filippo belonging to the Carducci Family has been kidnapped from Milan, and the boy in the pictures shown looks just like the boy in the hole. He overhears his parents and their friends talking about keeping the boy hidden. The next morning, he discovers his parents are hosting late-night meetings with the parents of his playmates and one domineering visitor "from the North" who now sleeps in his room. Michele, to his shock, gradually comes to realize that his own father is involved in the kidnapping, as well as some other men in the town. He visits the boy and tells him he knows his name and informs the boy of his mother and the message she left on the TV about him. This message was not received well by the boy, who still believes he is dead. Until Michele told him that he is a guardian angel and comes visits him, he promise to visit again. He continues visiting Filippo (Mattia di Pierro) and one day he lets him out for some hours of play in the wheat fields together, and then he returns him back to the hole. To win a toy as a present for Filippo, he barters with his best friend Salvatore for a toy blue van by offering to share a secret, and reveals to him Filippo's existence, but Salvatore is uncomfortable about the news, even though he surrenders the van and promises Michele that he will not share his secret with anyone else.
On Michele's next visit to Filippo, he is caught by one of the kidnappers (the older brother of Skull), who finds him in the hole with Filippo and punches him, then hauls him out and drives him home. It turns out that Michele's friend Salvatore has revealed his secret to Skull's brother. His parents have contrasting reactions to his being apprehended. His mother defies Michele's attacker, in defense of her son, but his father, on learning that he has been visiting Filippo, threatens to beat him if he ever goes back to visit the boy again. Michele promises to obey his father. But then one day Skull cajoles his peers into again visiting the farmhouse, where Michele discovers the hole empty and Filippo gone. His friend-turned-traitor Salvatore readily tells him he knows where Filippo has been moved, having overheard his father tell Michele's father, and will tell him if Michele will forgive his betrayal. The next night, Michele overhears the adults discussing who will kill Filippo, and Michele sets out immediately to find Filippo — who is now in a "cave" — and save him. He hoists him out over a gate and tells him to run for his life, while Michele tries to find a way out for himself with no one to hoist him over the gate. Meanwhile, Michele's father has drawn the short straw and shows up at the cave to kill Filippo. Michele sees it is his father and runs toward him across the cave just as his father fires his gun, shooting his own son in the leg. In the film's last scene, Michele's father runs with Michele in his arms in search of medical aid, as the ringleader from the North (Milan) finds him and insists he has to resume his assigned task of killing Filippo. However, Filippo appears and risks his own danger to show gratitude to Michele, just as helicopters arrive and track down the ringleader trying to escape. The film ends with a repentant Pino clutching his son and Michele reaching out to Filippo.

Review: Set in Southern Italy in 1978, I'm Not Scared by Gabriele Salvatores (Mediterraneo) is about a child who discovers a small lad hidden in a cavernous hole near an abandoned farmhouse and acts with courage and compassion to "do the right thing".
The film is partly a standard commercial product with a predictable plot, sentimental music, and pseudo-lyrical slow motion shots but it also embodies an artistic sensibility that expressively captures the world of a child in its wonder, innocence, and beauty.
Similar to the 1996 film La Promesse by the Dardenne Brothers, it is a film about a young boy's awakening of conscience.Ten-year old Michele, exquisitely performed by first-time actor Giuseppe Cristiano, is outgoing, intelligent, and strong-willed and there is a great deal of warmth and knowing in his face that makes us instinctively care about him.
The story unfolds slowly but steadily.Because this movie is about kids and some suspicious people (Michele's father and friends)and the story is not written with a formula, there is an added dimension to the element of unpredictability.I truly was inspired by the cinematography showing the idyllic scenes of the summer and wheat fields of Italy, including the insects and wildlife.
"I'm Not Scared (Io non ho paura)"  has a lot in common with the recent Russian film "The Return (Vozvrashcheniye)."  Both start off with poor pre-teen boys' bullying games that then intersect with their returning fathers' parallel adult realities.
A major difference is the look that surrounds the contrasts between childhood innocence and male brutishness (abetted by cowed female complicity), where the Russian film is practically in a frigid black and white, the Italian film has the lush, sentimental cinematography of Italo Petriccione, who also worked with director Gabriele Salvatores on the dreamily beautiful "Mediterraneo." The suspenseful thriller aspects roped me in, though the tension was undercut a bit by the Lavender Hill Mob antics of the conspirators, but the bumbling added to an uneasy feeling of unpredictability, aided by the suspenseful music by Ezio Bosso and Pepo Scherman.
Having seen "Mediterraneo" from the same director, Gabriele Salvatores, was another reason for taking a look at this movie.The film depicts the horrors that Italy lived in the 70s with a wave of kidnappings.
While a lot had political undertones, the fact remains that a lot of children were kidnapped for a ransom.The idyllic way the film unfolds, with the children running freely in the wheat fields, is a sharp contrast of the mystery that is hidden, in a hole, by the abandoned house where they go to play.
Michele, the boy at the center of the story, discovers the dark secret that will involve his own family and will end in a tragedy.
Toward the end, it reaches for the sublime in moments of Michelangelo.For me, the emotional interaction of these very young non actors made the movie spiritual to some degree by way of it's sheer honesty, without compromising the true spirituality in the principles and very adult themes of good vs.
I saw this film on the Berlin film festival without having an idea of what may follow, and I was very surprised: this picture is one of the best, at least of this year.A young boy, growing up in a little village somewhere in Italy, discovers an other young boy hiding in a small hole.
Original and Sensitive Story of Innocence and Compassion  An Unforgettable Gem. In the field in the country of Italy, the ten years old Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano) accidentally finds a weird boy in a hole in an abandoned farmhouse.
The screenplay is perfect, developing the characters and disclosing the secrets through the innocent eyes of a ten years old boy, having a sensational plot point, in a wonderful landscape and a very sentimental soundtrack.
Well directed film by Gabriele Salvatores , including a stirring story and screenplay by Niccolò Ammaniti , who tried to create an agreeable flick plenty of sensitivity and metaphor by tackling a description about a bright ten-year-old boy who finds several surprises on his early life .
In southern Italy, Michele , a fine little boy , along with his friends visit an old rotten house on the outskirts of their small Italian village .
His style is pretty much dry in the atmosphere as in the fresh dialog , as well as realistic , and including pleasant elements as when the little boy runs on the cereal countryside ."I'm Not Scared" is one of Tornatore's undisputed masterpieces and fundamental in his filmography where shows efficiently an interesting story and shot at the height of his creativity , with some peculiar characters , as the main starring boy , his lovely mummy magnificently performed by the Spanish Aitana Sánchez Gijon and the grudge visitor well played by Diego Abatantuono .
They become friends, but Michelle soon realizes that his parents are the ones responsible for this kids kidnapping.It's a great children's film, a good thriller, and a bad drama.
There is both mystery and madness.Michele, a young boy about ten or so years old, plays with his sister and a small group of friends in empty fields and among ruins of once well-maintained farm houses, now mute ruins.
Closeups of small field creatures are shots which add nothing to the story and inject a contrived artificiality.Not many films successfully center a mysterious and terrifying predicament as a way of exploring children's emotional lives.
To me not only they are very interesting to see --at least one of them was totally unknown to me, city dweller that I am-- but they add a certain naivetè, like a certain magic, part of a child's view of the most common things.Besides they establish the location, a rural one, where little animals are usual things, so much so that our 10 year old boy never looks at them.
The story gets rolling when 10-year old Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano) and his discovery of a body hidden away in a pit near an abandoned farmhouse."I'm Not Scared" is a fantastic film that chills without cliché.
There is a lot in this movie: an economical issue (suthern Italy poverty in the 70 's), the role of society's rules on kids behaviour, the tension between two completely different cultures in one country (the big, rich city of the North and the small rural village in the south), the developement of ten years old Michele's personality...
The surreality continues as the plot occurs.Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano) is an average 10 year old boy in Southern Italy.
IO NON HO PAURA (I'M NOT SCARED) is a radiant film by director Gabriele Salvatores based on the novel by Niccolò Ammaniti (who also wrote the screenplay) that quietly puts the premise 'greater love hath no man than he lay down etc' into the desperately gentle innocence of children.
Over the next few days Michele finds that the hole person is a young boy his age, and though filthy and frightened the young lad Filippo (Mattia Di Pierro) grows to depend on Michele and reveals he is terrified, shackled and has been placed there to die.Meanwhile at Michele's odd little home there are strange conversations between his father Pino (Dino Abbrescia) and his mother (Aitana Sánchez-Gijon), friends enter their home and the emphasis is always on the television news.
The manner in which Michele tackles this ugly truth, laying down his own safety to prevent the adults from killing Filippo, is the way this movie winds to a superlative, uplifting end.So very much of this story is beyond words: the moments of silence, the looks in the eyes of the children, the power of the human spirit ensconced in the body of young lad named Michele, the manner in which the mind of Michele works through all of the adult reality and makes it credible in his fantasy world - all of these defy description.
Going into it blind was properly the perfect way to experience "I'm Not Afraid." This film swept me away like few have done in recent years.Set in 1970s Italy, this film is at its heart the intimate story of a young rural boy's quest to grow up moral in the face of scary, even evil truths around him.
The film is about  ten year old Michele living with his family in rural Southern Italy.
While searching for his mother's glasses he finds ten year old Filippo imprisoned in a cave, and while they develop a sort of friendship Michele discovers the violent, cruel and corrupt world of adults.
This is a truly beautiful film, from the stunning cinematography all the way to the very emotional story of two young boys meeting under extraordinary (and scary) circumstances.
In the film, entitled "I'm Not Scared" Giuseppe Cristiano portrays Michele, a ten year old Italian boy who's idyllic life in the countryside is interrupted one day with the discovery of a sensational crime.
The brilliantly sunny wheat fields of Italy are contrasted with a dank, dark hole accidentally discovered by a young boy after his sister loses here eyeglasses; the black hole houses an even darker surprise that affects him with consequences never anticipated.Much more than a simple suspense tale, this evocative immersion in Italian country life depicts a young man grappling with moral issues as simple as peace with his friends and as complex as the integrity of his parents; it dazzles the eye with the color of brilliant orange field flowers, teases the mind with probable outcomes, and satisfies the intellect with puzzles which linger in the mind about the world we build for our children.
What comes to mind right now is my thought that perhaps this is the movie Guillermo Del Toro was going for with Pan's Labyrinth, a story of a young child with a penchant for games and fantasy who is ennobled by how they interact with the dark, twisted, dangerous adult world that functions as a backdrop.
The vivid scenery---many views of fields and hills of wheat, this endless land being the backyard for the town children and the setting of their childhood adventures---employs an acutely emboldened, clear-cut primary color scheme to depict how Michele, as a nine-year-old boy, sees the world, fixating on particular items of fascination with close-ups.
It seems like a picture-perfect indigenous location that bears the likes of a tourist's idea of a traditional Italian holiday.The real star is 9-10 year old Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano), the rurally kept pre-adolescent protagonist following his discovery of a feral blind boy Filippo (Mattia Di Pierro), who's chained up in a hole in the ground beside a ruined farm.
First the first where we first see Filippo really freaked me out!But even if you think the film is going to be a giant action American movie it keeps all along his Italian character.The views of Southern Italy are wonderful and it really shows the truth because I've been there and it's just like that, misery, heat and all those things...
I'M NOT SCARED is an Italian crime thriller told through the eyes of a young boy whose father and associates in poverty-ridden southern Italy have kidnapped a kid from the wealthy north, and are holding him for ransom on an abandoned farm.
The Italian country is the backdrop for the story, and it's pictured in such a beautiful way, with those amazing sunsets and yellow fields, it gives you a full emotional punch when the plot starts to take form and you're set to discover the secret that lies beneath the ground.
To my knowledge, very few comments on or reviews of this film make reference to another Italian movie on the same subject matter: the 1993 "La corsa dell'innocente"  (released as "The Flight of the Innocent" in the U.S.) Each is set in Calabria, either totally as with this new movie, or partially, as in "Corsa."  Each deals with the kidnapping of children of wealthy northern families by Mafioso-style families in the region of Calabria (the Ndrangheta.) Each has a young boy as a hero of superior innate morality who cares about what is good and rejects what is evil.
That having been said, I only want to point out the captivating story-book beauty of this movie, so wonderfully photographed, lovingly directed by Gabriele Salvatores of "Mediterraneo" fame, and finely acted by the young cast.
"Io non ho paura" literally "I'm Not Scared"This film is a coming of age story set within a mystery (or vice-versa as you prefer) about a ten year old Italian boy in 1978.
Ten-year-old Michele discovers the hiding place of kidnap victim Filippo, a boy his own age.
In this lackadaisical Italian thriller, a 10 year-old boy named Michele discovers a deep pit in a field near his rural home.
This is a great set-up for a thriller (based on true events), and there are some wonderful scenes, particularly the ones between Michele and Fillipo (the boy in the hole).
"I'm Not Scared" follows the activities of a ten year old boy in the remote wheat fields of Southern Italy as he rides his bike, plays with friends, rides his bike some more, finds a kidnapped kid in a hole in the ground, and rides his bike still more.
www.film-studies.net In a welcome addition to the list of texts,Leaving Certificate students in Ireland are being given the chance to study "I'm Not Scared" as part of their Comparative Study in English.Michele, a young boy living in the poverty of "Southern Italy 1978" starts to realise that he does not have to behave exactly as others, especially his parents, tell him to do.
It is refreshingly surprising to find such a good movie.The film is visually fantastic, the scenery and colors are the narrator telling the story while the characters play necessary but secondary roles.Personally, I didn't like the ending very much but it is easily forgiven after all the beauty exhibited.The film takes you into a hole, into the dream world of a ten 10 year old surrounded by nothingness, where ugliness and depravity doesn't exist.
I'M NOT SCARED, despite the thriller-ish premise, is a film that's all about friendship: a growing bond that develops between an Italian boy and the kidnapped child he finds being held to ransom in a filthy pit.
Boys 2 Men. In beautiful southern Italy, 1978, sensitive ten-year-old Giuseppe Cristiano (as Michele) plays with his friends, in a hot, deserted area (likely forbidden by their parents).
Harry Potter's adolescent confusion about the appearance of adult morality and the reality of their corruption is nothing compared to young Michele's harrowing discovery and decisions in `I'm Not Scared.'  Gabriele Salvatores (`Mediterraneo', Oscar winner for best foreign film in 1992) directs this thriller (which Niccolo Ammaniti adapted with Francesca Marciano from Ammaniti's novel) with a Terrence Malick `Days of Heaven' eye for the lush, waving grain of 1978 Southern Italy and a Poe-like treatment of terrible incarceration.Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano) finds another 10-year-old boy, Filippo (Mattia Di Pierro), chained to the bottom of a pit in an abandoned farm.
The loss of innocence can be a frightening experience, especially for ten-year-old Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano), who discovers that another boy is being held captive in a deep hole next to an abandon farmhouse.
Not only is it frightening to see a child your own age shackled, hungry and thirsty, living in filth, but when Michele realizes his own father may be a kidnapper, he hardly knows what to do.That is the basis for Director Gabriele Salvatores' wonderful film from the best selling Italian novel, `Io non ho paura.'  The film, shot almost entirely from the perspective of a youngster, was Italy's entry in this year's Academy Awards.
The final music is a little too pretty and arty and the ending is a little too good to be true (more so than the book's), but Salvatores' film is a memorable evocation of childhood, brilliantly acted by the children, especially the gifted Cristiano -- with links to other striking tales of a child's discovery of adult evil like Carol Reed's 1948 The Fallen Idol.
Michele(Giuseppe Cristiano) is 10 year old boy who lives near a wheat field with his family.
One night, Michele wakes up and listen to his father and his father's friends talking about a kidnapped boy called Filippo, and when he sees Filippo's picture in TV he immediately discovers that he is the boy he found out in the cave.This movie is very good and is based in a real life event, what makes it even better and surprising to watch..
But then he takes him back to the hole probably because neither of the boys can think of anything better to do.Towards the end, reality takes over from fantasy as the movie moves towards being both a thriller and a coming-of-age (the hard way) story.The director takes time to patiently show us a lot of details which make the movie a full experience instead of a one-dimensional Hollywood-style crafted thriller.
Set in Italy, the film follows the young protagonist, Michele, as he discovers a boy living in a hole.What starts out as a seemingly innocent depiction of friendship soon unfolds as a dramatic and gripping thriller.
The two boys develop a friendship, but Michele realizes he's fairly helpless to assist the prisoner because he discovers that not only his parents, but his whole rural village, are in on it.*** SPOILERS END ***I never saw "Mediterraneo," Salvatore's Oscar-winning film from a few years back, but now I feel I need to.
*********** MILD SPOILERS ALERT **********The ending made me feel a lump in my throat, but actually the whole picture is such a graceful and moving rendition of an altogether quite tragic reality that plagued Italy for a very long time, especially in the Seventies (the story takes place in that by now remote era), i.e. the ransom-aimed kidnapping of the young children of rich people.Here Filippo, the kidnapped little boy, is inhumanely kept in a cave like a dirty animal - until his "guardian angel" comes, embodied by Michele, a kid of his same age.