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Nuovomondo or The Golden Door, written and directed by Emanuele Crialese, is a film about Sicilian peasants emigrating to America. It’s received almost universal acclaim, but for me, the movie jarred and bored alternately.
Talk about stereotypes! The Sicilians were portrayed as ignorant, superstitious simpletons permanently coated in a thick layer of grime. The film opens with two of the characters scrambling barefoot up a rocky scree, carrying rocks in their mouths. They were small enough to fit in a pocket or shoulder bag, but no, they have to cut their mouths transporting them in this unnecessarily troublesome way.
The rocks are offerings to a shrine in exchange for inspiration – should we go to America or not? We shall wait here until you answer. Cue the mute scrambling up bearing picture postcards showing money trees and giant vegetables to be found in America. That clinches it! We’re off!
Later, we are at the docks, and the extras carpeting the quayside are self-consciously putting (obviously empty) bottles to their mouths and eating their simple peasant food as the camera moves slowly through the recumbent masses. I didn’t actually spot anyone secretly mouthing ‘hello mum’, wearing an iPod or even sneaking a sideways glance in our direction but the scene was wooden and unconvincing when it should have been bustling, confusing, chaotic and alive.
So they board the ship and set sail. But do we witness any of the excitement, farewells, tears of separation, last minute pleas to write or reminders to feed the goats? No. Instead we see a silent peasant throng slowly part as the ship leaves the dock. Visually surprising – a clever little cinematic joke – but it’s not the way passenger liners would have set sail. At the same time, the soundtrack has an absurd unrealistic machine-like noise which I imagine is supposed to represent the ship’s engines.
Throughout the film, the camera is kept tight on the subjects. We never see the whole ship, for example. On board, not only are conditions more cramped than a slave ship, but the set designer ordered a few too many ventilation funnels so there is much appearing and disappearing behind these obstructions on deck. What little water we can see in the background is flat calm and clearly not the Atlantic Ocean!
Meanwhile down below, the hapless passengers are tossed about so violently that they can’t stand up. I thought we must be going down with the Poseidon but then I remembered these are Sicilian peasants and it’s all a bit new to them, this balancing on a moving deck. As if to drive the point home, granny remarks that there is no land to be seen – something which she is clearly struggling to get her head round, despite having lived all her life on a small island.
But there are further brain-teasers in store for granny when she gets to Ellis Island – and I don’t mean the logic puzzles they are asked to complete. There are communal showers which produce a deluge of – what can it be? Water? Granny has never seen so much flowing water – and she overcomes her incredulity in order to have a good wash. Unfortunately, being Sicilian peasants their hands remain coated in grime after the shower and each of their fingernails has enough John Innes underneath them to grow a kilo of carrots.
Which brings me to the giant carrot floating in milk. Actually I’m OK with dreams, fantasies, symbolism and surreal images. So I quite liked the carrot Lilo. What bugged and bored me were the other scenes which were not meant to be fantastical, but nevertheless failed to convince. I just felt a bit insulted that the film laid the message on so thick. There was no subtlety, yet a few bizarre moments are sprinkled in the mix here and there to keep us thinking that this film is cleverer or deeper than it is. Like that pointless sub-Twin Peaks silent moment between granny and Charlotte Gainsbourg’s character. And – even worse – the risible scene near the end of the film where the mute speaks.
What are we supposed to make of Lucy Reed? How unconvincing, unendearing and superficial a character was she?
I couldn’t wait to leave my seat and make for the door.
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