In the turbulent politics of post war Italy, former Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti stands head and shoulders above all others, having been elected no fewer than seven times to the Italian parliament.
This extravagant new film from Paolo Sorrentino, the director of The Consequences of Love, traces the highlights of Andreotti’s spectacular life, and in particular, his career as the Premier in the chaotic days of the 1970s, when the country’s weak political elite was in the hands of organised crime and besieged by terrorism.
With Il Divo, Sorrentino boldly attempts to re-invent the political thriller, eschewing the genre’s hardboiled conventions. He opts instead for a pop/operatic score, swooping camerawork and grotesque characterisations to denote the decadence of Italian public life in the 1970s and 1980s.
With a dazzling performance by Tony Servillo as Andreotti, this is a compelling portrait of excess, corruption and self indulgence from Italy’s hottest director.