FILM INTERVIEW: MARCO AMENTA

Director of 'The Sicilian Girl' Talks Tension, Integrity & Mafia Influence

By: Thomas Sullivan

August 8, 2010

For his first feature, Sicilian-born director Marco Amenta chose a topic that was familiar to him but not familiar to many others: the harrowing story of Rita Atria, a Sicilian mafia daughter who defied the mafia code of silence to testify against the men who killed her brother and father. In this interview, Marco tells us why he’s so fascinated with the story, and about the astounding amount of work that went into making and releasing the film:

Thomas Sullivan: You’ve produced the documentary about the true life story of Rita ten years ago, and now there’s this adaptation. What really drew you to the story?

Marco Amenta: I think it’s a very unique story, like a Greek tragedy. There’s the archetype of the heroine, and it’s shown from the perspective of a girl. It’s a different perspective on the mafia. It shows another side — the bad side of the mafia, how they aren’t charming all the time, and how they’re cowardly, not always courageous. Initially, she sees mafia figures as sort of Robin Hoods — fairytale people. When she goes to the police, though, she wants revenge. The mafia is good and the police are bad, but then at the end of the film, it changes completely. You cannot express that with a documentary. It’s deeper. You can go a lot deeper with the movie and through cinema. You talk to the emotional level, to the guts of the people, because you work with images, colors, and music, etc. Not many people know the story either! Italy is famous for the mafia and these corrupt political people, so sometimes it’s good to show that there are good people that fight against these bad things. There are mafia and anti-mafia people.

TS: Was there any conflict over the film in Italy?

MA: Some parts of Rita’s family and some people from the village were very upset about it. When you talk about mafia, it’s always controversial. You have to be very careful. That’s why I changed the names of the people in the film to have legal protection, and I shot in a different village than the one Rita was from.

TS: Does the mafia there have a large affect on the government? Is there still a lot of tension?

MA: The mafia isn’t really for or against the government — they’re more inside it. The technique of the mafia is to get people inside and get exchanges. The mafia goes where there’s power and money, and they infiltrate various parts of society and work together with them. That’s why it’s difficult to fight it. More and more they become smart and sophisticated and they send their kids to schools like Harvard. They become doctors, lawyers, and businessmen. Now they kill less because they understand that the less they do, the less people write about them. They lose business, but they stay quiet.

TS: Some people apparently still have animosity toward Rita. Is she still regarded as a bad figure, or are people more supportive?

MA: No! In Italy, she’s more of a heroine. Any mafia witness will never be fully accepted since each breaks the mafia code of silence. She put dirt on her village, so to speak. She betrayed them. The group of people close to her are not happy about what she did, but honest people around Italy see her as a heroine. But still, she wasn’t very well known.

TS: Did you take any liberties with the adaptation?

MA: Yes, I did. I did the documentary already — that’s not really an investigation or anything like that. It’s more of an art piece. For me, it was more important to focus on that psychological and emotional journey, to tell the story about the girl, the feeling. In order to tell the story the best way, I had to change the names. I got threatened a few times, actually, because of using real names. I changed the name of the village. The meaning is, of course, still there, though. I’m confident about my choices.

TS: Did Rita have a relationship with that one boy that was involved with the mafia?

MA: We don’t know if it’s actually true, but yes, it happened. Actually, in the real story, she accused him and he was arrested and acquitted.

TS: How did you find the actress that played Rita?

MA: She never trained as an actress, but she has this natural strength that is very distinct. I did a lot of tests of hundreds of people. People initially wanted someone more glamorous and femme fatale-esque, but for me, it was more important to find someone who was more “true”. She also spoke dialects, and that was really important, as people use Italian dialects in the film. I wanted that realism and someone who would play it to the gut. She really became the character. I let her improvise and build the character as much as possible. During the shooting, I would never have to tell her to be sad or anything because, at that moment, she was expressing her true feelings as the character. If you see her in real life, she’s actually very reserved! You have to dig about to find these things in people.

TS: What did you find to be more challenging to make: the documentary or the film?

MA: It’s easier to tell the story in documentary form. You don’t have the characters of the mafia because they don’t want to contribute, etc. In the documentary, it’s very narrative-based — you follow the story as it unfolds in the present tense. Shooting the feature film is difficult. Creativity goes fully into creating that world. You have a white room and you transform it into Rita’s house or something along those lines. It’s like a big machine that you’re kind of afraid to operate. If everything goes well, though, it’s like you’re the director of an orchestra.