Created by directors Antonio Piazza and Fabio Grassadonia, Iddu is the grotesque portrait of mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro, who was arrested in January 2023 after thirty years on the run and who died 8 months later.
The screenplay is freely inspired by the 2004 correspondence between the fugitive and the former mayor of Castelvetrano and by the context – tragic and ridiculous, paradoxical and very real – that emerges from those letters. The result is a black comedy that focuses on Matteo (Elio Germano) and the imaginary character of Catello Palumbo (Toni Servillo).
This story is filmed in places very close to those where the boss was born and lived as a fugitive, namely the province of Trapani. Filmed mainly indoors, the film also shows the natural settings of the Riserva naturale orientata del fiume Belice and nearby Selinunte archaeological park.
Other locations included Salemi (historic centre and piazza Libertà for a barber's salon), Trapani and Sciacca.
Created by directors Antonio Piazza and Fabio Grassadonia, Iddu is the grotesque portrait of mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro, who was arrested in January 2023 after thirty years on the run and who died 8 months later.
The screenplay is freely inspired by the 2004 correspondence between the fugitive and the former mayor of Castelvetrano and by the context – tragic and ridiculous, paradoxical and very real – that emerges from those letters. The result is a black comedy that focuses on Matteo (Elio Germano) and the imaginary character of Catello Palumbo (Toni Servillo).
This story is filmed in places very close to those where the boss was born and lived as a fugitive, namely the province of Trapani. Filmed mainly indoors, the film also shows the natural settings of the Riserva naturale orientata del fiume Belice and nearby Selinunte archaeological park.
Other locations included Salemi (historic centre and piazza Libertà for a barber's salon), Trapani and Sciacca.
Sicily, early 2000s. After years in prison for mafia crimes, Catello, a long-time politician, has lost everything. When the Italian Secret Services ask him for help in capturing his godson Matteo, the last major mafia fugitive, Catello seizes the opportunity to get back in the game. A cunning man with a hundred faces, a tireless illusionist who transforms truth into lies and lies into truth, Catello creates a unique, and equally unlikely, exchange of letters with the fugitive, trying to take advantage of his emotional void. A gamble that with one of the most wanted criminals in the world requires a risk or two...