Synopsis Misericordia, directed by Emma Dante
Sicily, a small fishing village surrounded by rubbish and wreckage. Behind it, a majestic mountain. This is where Arturo, the son of a prostitute who dies in childbirth, is born. Arturo is raised by the three other prostitutes, Betta, Nuccia and young Anna, who take care of him as if he were a son, in the mercy of a desperate love made up of caresses and impatience, cruelty and tenderness.
Arturo is now 18 years old, at times looking like a child, at others very old. Born defective, he moves weirdly and participates in the world with a different spirit. He looks at the people around him like at the mountain he climbs: without fear. He is an invisible among the invisible and must fight, like everyone in Contrada Tuono, for survival, but his pure and different gaze carries hope.
DIRECTOR’S NOTES:
Misericordia depicts a reality steeped in poverty, illiteracy and provincialism. It explores a nightmarish state of terrible degradation, increasingly ignored by society. It recounts the fragility of women, the violence that continues to be perpetuated against them, their desperate and boundless solitude.