Se fate i bravi

Belgium, Italy, 2022, 100'

History never goes out of style. History is always time, a past that affects the present. The events of Genoa in 2001 – the dreams and illusions of a generation, the hopes of a crowd of protesters, the violence in the streets and then the tortures in the ill-famed barracks of Bolzaneto – are now 21 years away. Therefore, they are apparently very distant, and yet they’re still there, making part of the present in which we live, the child of rightful ideals, lost battles, or those to fight yet (the challenge to globalisation, the alert on the exploitation of the planet, the unequal distribution of wealth, the denial of rights…). For those who were in Genoa and saw their life turned upside down over a night of unprecedented violence – such as Turin-born Evandro Fornasier, who was arrested and tortured for no reason – Genoa is both a destination and a point of departure; for those who weren’t, it is a warning, and a lesson. In Gaglianone’s film, listening to Fornasier’s own account of those days makes you shudder, leaves you dismayed, and forces you to wonder, once again, how it was possible, in a democratic country, to suspend the rule of law for a never-ending night and beyond.