At first, the violence seems limited to news reports. Every time a gangster is gunned down or a car bomb goes off in the streets of Corsica, the local channel flashes footage of the crime scene. So long as the killings are confined to television, it’s easy for 15-year-old Lesia to pretend they’re neither real nor relevant, that the people involved aren’t members of her father’s inner circle. But as “The Kingdom” unfolds, the attacks keep getting closer, slowly infiltrating the film itself, until finally, they’re happening right in front of her face.
Corsica, like nearby Sicily, has a serious problem with organized crime, which escalated dramatically in the 1990s, when “The Kingdom” is set. The birthplace of Napoleon Bonaparte, it’s an unusual island: technically part of France, but too independent-minded to let outsiders manage its affairs. The Corsican flag depicts a decapitated Moorish head against a field of white, warning outsiders how the natives deal with unwelcome incursions — the same way that caïds (or local big shots) handle those who step out of line: with “une balle dans la tête,” or a bullet in the head.
In his sure-handed and chilling first narrative feature, director Julien Colonna examines the personal cost of the gangster lifestyle — not just the drastically shortened life expectancy, but also the diminished quality of fugitives’ remaining time, so much of which must be spent covering their tracks and looking over their shoulders. Colonna largely downplays the spectacle associated with the genre, keeping the “whackings” off-screen until relatively late in the game … at which point, they’re stone-cold efficient.
But this is a coming-of-age film, and Colonna privileges young Lesia’s initially naive but increasingly self-aware perspective, relying on a terrific performance from sun-baked newcomer Ghjuvanna Benedetti, whose piercing gaze and sharp profile suggest a potentially lethal precocity. Colonna, who is Corsican, made a point of casting native actors with authentic accents (signature expressions like “aio” and “basta” are left untranslated in subtitles) in an attempt to counter more sensationalist portrayals, such as 2004’s bloody “The Corsican File” or 2017’s Cannes-selected “A Violent Life.”
Tough teenage Lesia is enjoying the summer break when her aunt whisks the girl to the middle of nowhere and drops her with her father, Pierre-Paul (Saveriu Santucci). Lesia knows the drill: Pierre-Paul has been a fugitive for as long as she can remember. Phone calls are forbidden, lest rivals or authorities are monitoring the line. If they should discover his location, all of their lives could be in danger.
Things are even more tense than usual this visit, as local news covers an assassination attempt on a politician connected to her father. A few days later, her godfather is gunned down in town. Things are obviously heating up on the island, as one or more of the rival caïds are planning a power grab, and Pierre-Paul readies his men accordingly. Audiences learn their faces from Lesia’s point of view, presented like so many surrogate uncles. Before long, TV reports are running their photos alongside footage of bullet-riddled cars and weeping widows.
Lesia adores her dad, accompanying him on fishing trips and hunting wild boar together, but when it comes time to hook the trout or pull the trigger, she makes a point of sparing the animals. And yet, in the opening scene, we see Lesia’s unflinching ability to field-dress her prey. Obviously, she does possess the capacity to kill. Over the course of “The Kingdom,” she will let go of whatever illusions she had about her father and come to terms with what his work entails.
Early on, she’s ordered to stay home while the men disappear all day. But little by little, Pierre-Paul allows Lesia to listen in on compromising conversations, revealing how they plan to strike before their rivals can get to them. A bit too old to play an innocent teen, Benedetti is nevertheless ideal to embody the alert, inquisitive side of the character. From Lesia’s perspective, Pierre-Paul is an honorable figure. The film is ambiguous enough that he could just as easily be a nationalist militant (a sort of local hero) as an organized criminal (more likely the case).
And yet, as the story unfolds, it becomes increasingly clear that this man who has been so benevolent to Lesia is capable of truly cold-blooded acts. Santucci masterfully balances these conflicting sides of Pierre-Paul’s personality in two key scenes: First, there’s the long conversation with Lesia at a campsite, in which he lays out everything that his lifestyle has cost him. And then there’s the twist, when we learn the real reason he chose this location.
Compared with the “Godfather” films (this decidedly anti-glamorous portrait is practically the antithesis of Coppola’s approach), “The Kingdom” reframes things from the vantage of the Sofia Coppola character. It’s like “The Sopranos,” as seen through Meadow’s eyes. And though we’re all familiar with the lesson that the cost of vengeance is a never-ending circle of violence, Colonna’s retelling lands like a bullet in the head.
Source Agencies
