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The Arts Intel Report

A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler
A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler

Adagio

Francesco Di Leva and Toni Servillo in Adagio.

This third film in a trilogy about crime in Rome by gangster auteur Stefano Sollima (whose TV series include Gomorrah and Zero Zero Zero) feels like an elegy for a generation. Former Magliana-gang boss Daytona (Toni Servillo, slipping in and out of reality) hangs out in his apartment repeating the multiplication tables to stave off his dementia. His old friend Cammello (Pierfrancesco Favino, hollow-eyed and stoic) is dying of cancer and just wants to be left alone. Another is now blind. These broken-down old men no longer trouble the police. But when some corrupt cops recruit Daytona’s son, Manuel (Gianmarco Franchini), to infiltrate a party and take pictures of a cross-dressing, drug-dispensing government minister, Daytona and Cammello step gingerly back into action. The theme of fathers and sons and a certain code of honor play out in moving ways here, but this is not some feel-good last hurrah. Sollima is too much of a realist for that. —Lisa Henricksson

Photo courtesy of Netflix