News from Italy
Una fotografia che cattura lo spirito dei temp
The film revolves around two old friends in their fifties, Carlobianchi and Doriano. The two characters constantly wander through small towns and bars across Veneto in search of “one last drink.” Their lives are shaped by economic collapse, personal failure, and an attachment to the past. During their journey, they pick up Giulio, a young architecture student, and the three embark on a nocturnal provincial odyssey.
In the background lingers the figure of “Genio,” an old friend expected to return from Argentina, along with the story of money, or perhaps treasure —hidden years earlier. Yet the film is not a road movie in the classical sense: the characters’ movement does not represent a concrete goal, but rather a way of postponing the emptiness of existence.
The film contains no explicit political slogans, yet it possesses a strong political background. Veneto has long been shaped by dynamics such as regionalism, right-wing populism, Lega Nord politics, distrust toward the central state, and economic individualism. As economic growth came to a halt, this social model entered a deep crisis. People now live within the nostalgia of past prosperity while struggling to imagine a collective future. The persistent sense of “historical lateness” felt throughout the film is closely tied to this political atmosphere. The characters feel left behind not only individually but also historically. For this reason, Le città di pianura can be considered one of the most significant films about the political loneliness of the contemporary European countryside.
At first glance, Francesco Sossai’s Le città di pianura appears to be a minimalist provincial film about the nighttime journey of a few lost men. Yet the film’s true strength lies not in the individual crises of its characters, but in its ability to reveal the historical and sociological transformation of the geography they inhabit. The film portrays the late-capitalist transformation of contemporary Northern Italy- especially the Veneto region- its post-industrial collapse, and the social void produced by it.
Sossai’s camera observes not only people, but also roads, gas stations, abandoned industrial zones, neon-lit bars, and the unfinished architecture of modernisation. For this reason, Le città di pianura should be read not merely as a road movie, but as a sociological elegy for a society that has lost its direction after the end of economic prosperity.
Veneto: Italy’s Silent Economic Miracle
The Veneto region was one of the main engines of Italy’s postwar economic rise. Beginning in the 1960s, the region rapidly accumulated wealth through small family businesses, provincial workshops, and local industrial clusters. Rather than relying on large Fordist factories, Venetian capitalism was built upon networks of interconnected small-scale production.
Sociologists described this structure as “molecular capitalism.” Thanks to the density of small enterprises, Veneto became associated for decades with low unemployment, high productivity, and a strong sense of local belonging.
Yet this model of prosperity was also fragile. Globalisation, competition from Chinese manufacturing, European economic crises, and the 2008 financial collapse severely shook Veneto’s small-scale production system. The abandoned warehouses, empty roads, and exhausted characters seen in the film are direct consequences of this historical rupture. In Sossai’s world, production has stopped, yet the architecture of the production society remains. People continue to move, but the economic and social order has dissolved.
“Città Diffusa”: A Decentralized Life
To understand the film’s title, one must consider Veneto’s unique spatial structure. The region is neither fully rural nor entirely urbanized. Factories, small towns, shopping areas, highways, and industrial zones are continuously interconnected. In Italian urban sociology, this structure is called “città diffusa,” or the “diffused city.” In this mode, there is no clear centre; the boundaries between urban and rural areas disappear; people are constantly in motion; life is organized around automobiles and roads.
The characters in the film do not openly discuss politics, yet the sense that “we used to be something” is ever-present. For this reason, many critics have interpreted the film as an elegy for post-industrial Northern Italy.
Le città di pianura transforms this feeling of decentralized existence precisely into cinematic language. The characters are constantly on the road, yet they never truly arrive anywhere, because the social structure they inhabit no longer produces direction or centrality. The long driving sequences are not merely aesthetic choices; they are sociological expressions of late-capitalist provincial life.
Crisis of Masculinity and the Collapse of Work Ethic
The male characters at the centre of the film embody typical figures of old Venetian society: lives built around physical labour; silent forms of communication; emotional repression; male solidarity constructed through friendship. Yet throughout the film this model of masculinity appears dysfunctional. The characters’ constant drinking, wandering, and repetition of old stories represent attempts to fill the void left behind by the collapse of the work ethic.
Bars are crucial here. In the Venetian countryside, the bar is not merely a place of entertainment, but a social space where masculine identity is reproduced. Following unemployment, economic collapse, and social fragmentation, these spaces become sites of nostalgia. The characters cling to the remnants of the production society, yet the economic order that once defined them no longer exists. Masculinity in the film therefore appears not strong but fragile. Bodies constantly in motion are, in fact, socially displaced bodies.
Post-Industrial Melancholy
The dominant emotional atmosphere of the film is melancholy. Yet this melancholy is less an individual depression than a collective emotional condition.
Echoing Mark Fisher’s concept of “capitalist realism,” the characters seem unable to imagine a future outside the existing order. The old world has collapsed, but a new one has not yet emerged. Time itself appears suspended. The night never ends. The journey never arrives anywhere. Dialogues endlessly repeat themselves. People cannot detach themselves from the past. Sossai’s cinema thus reveals the psychological consequences of economic collapse: disorientation, temporal paralysis, and social exhaustion.
An Anti-Postcard of Tourist Italy
The film also overturns conventional representations of Italy. International cinema often portrays Italy through romantic cities, historical squares, sunny landscapes, and Mediterranean joy. Sossai presents the exact opposite: foggy plains; ring roads; highway-side bars; empty parking lots; closed businesses; neon lights.
This aesthetic choice carries political meaning. The film makes visible the invisible geographies of neoliberal Europe. Behind the polished image of tourist Italy lie economically exhausted provincial regions. Le città di pianura is the film about this invisible Italy.
Political Subtext: The Silent Crisis of Northern Italy
The film offers no direct political slogans, yet it is deeply political in its background. For decades, Veneto has been shaped by regionalism, right-wing populism, Lega Nord politics, distrust of the central state, and economic individualism. With the slowing of economic growth, this social model entered crisis. People now live in nostalgia for past prosperity while struggling to imagine a shared future.
The constant sense of “arriving too late” felt throughout the film is closely connected to this political atmosphere. The characters feel left behind not only individually, but historically. For this reason, Le città di pianura can be read as one of the most important films about the silent crisis of the contemporary European countryside.
Although on the surface it appears to be a small-scale road story, Le città di pianura is fundamentally a powerful political and sociological text about Veneto’s economic transformation, the crisis of masculinity, decentralised forms of life, and post-industrial melancholy. Francesco Sossai’s achievement lies in his ability to portray the collapse of an era through the empty spaces of everyday life without resorting to overt ideological declarations.
The characters are not merely lost individuals; they are also the bearers of a collapsing economic model, an exhausted social identity, and a geography that has lost its future.
For this reason, Le città di pianura can be regarded as one of the most important contemporary Italian films about the silent crisis of modern European provincial life.