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| Images courtesy of Radiance Films |
The true story of Italian fascist prefect Cesare Mori who
took on the Sicilian Mafia with a brutally ruthless iron fist, earning him the
moniker The Iron Prefect, began in the 1920s when he took office as the
prefect of Bologna before being appointed prefect of Trapani and eventually
Palermo under the personal appointment of Benito Mussolini. Given carte blanche over all of Sicily tasked
with the mission of eliminating the Mafia by any means necessary however
fascistic, Cesare Mori proceeded in 1926 with what became known as the
occupation of the village of Gangi, which was a hiding ground for gangsters.
House by house, carabinieri and police forces searched homes
and snuffed out criminals using smoke, fire and other weaponry. Over 11,000 people were arrested and the prefect
sought to establish a bond between the populace and the state showing
criminality would not prevail over the people.
But in so doing, the prefect also inadvertently discovers collusion
between the Mafia, the State and the Fascist party and his own position of
power as The Iron Prefect becomes threatened as he finds himself in a moral
quandary before being dismissed while the Fascist party conveniently formally
declares the defeat of the Mafia.
Circa 1977, The Climber director Pasquale Squitieri and
screenwriter Ugo Pirro sought to bring the tale of The Iron Prefect and
specifically his invasion of Gangi to the silver screen, resulting in a
powerful David di Donatello award winning crime epic that follows in the bleak,
mordantly satirical outlook of Radiance Films’ own recently released Cosa Nostra box which highlighted growing criminality and corruption within the
government and police systems. Played by
A Pistol for Ringo actor Giuliano Gemma as a stoic indefatigable man often
considered as having cleaned house with the Mafia, the role which won the actor
the top prize at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival comes against what we expect
from the actor as a conflicted hero who bulldozes over Gangi and finds himself
at crossroads after doing so.
Coming against the prefect is Anna Torrisi (legendary
actress Claudia Cardinale), a villager who finds herself and her family being
torn apart by the arrests who represents the people of the village of Gangi in
microcosm. Walking barefoot across rocky
and ragged terrain among other villagers just scraping by for survival on what
little means they have. While initially
the prefect tries to meet Torrisi in the middle, offering her food and clothing
for her family which she flatly refuses, eventually he is forced to turn off
the water of the village prior to the invasion, further turning up the heat on
the populace to snuff out the mobsters. An
integral counterpoint to the prefect’s sense of perfected righteousness, over
time Torrisi begins to peel back layers that cast the whole endeavor of the
prefect in a different light.
Visually speaking The Iron Prefect looks
breathtaking, lensing the open rocky terrain of Sicily with wide angled open vistas
interspersed between tight close-ups of the actors faces by The Great
Silence cinematographer Silvano Ippoliti.
A striking, recurring vista involves the golden desert lands being
invaded by a tiny cloaked-in-black figure with a rifle representing the prefect’s
propensity to simply appear at the doorsteps of those he’s either about to
arrest or kill. Washing over the whole
film with somber melancholy is legendary Italian composer Ennio Morricone’s downbeat
original score. While we’re witnessing
what’s often referred to as the cleanup of the mafia, the film isn’t too happy
about it and soon the film’s mood representing the feelings of the people of
Gangi starts to catch up with the prefect.
Starting out as a historical crime drama before becoming a satirical
and somber critique of crime fighting doing little more than fostering bigger crimes
in the political hierarchy, The Iron Prefect also named I Am the Law in
some territories was not without its measure of controversy. Critics complained the film tended to
downplay the fascism of Cesare Mori, though looking at it now it is hard to
concur as the whole point of the film seems to involve the warring mob, the fascists
and the state being one in the same.
Moreover, the film’s version of Cesare Mori begins to question
everything he thought he knew about his mission and position of power and
whether or not anything substantive in combating Italian crime syndicates was
achieved at all. The Iron Prefect curtailed
crime with an iron fist, but did it really make one iota of difference in the
end?
--Andrew Kotwicki
