The World Will Vanish in Laughter

A child is born, children play carelessly at the beach, they happily jump in the water, play football and rumble around the streets of the city they love and admire. And then, an ominous white smoke comes out of the ever present factory chimney not so far away. The city is Taranto in Southern Italy, home of a steel mill factory since the 1960s, one of the biggest pollutants in Italy and in Europe.

Children are the main protagonists in Bangarang, a powerful first feature-length documentary by Italian director Giulio Mastromauro.

As I searched for information about the steel mill factory in Taranto, I came across the news published by Reuters on June 25, 2024:

“A steel plant in the southern Italian city of Taranto should be shut down if it poses significant threats to the environment and human health, the European Court of Justice said on June 25, 2024. The plant, which once had the largest output in Europe, remains a major employer in an economically depressed part of southern Italy. It is heavily indebted and has faced legal challenges over its environmental and health impacts for years. ‘Where there are serious and significant threats to the integrity of the environment and human health … the operation of the installation must be suspended,’ the EU court said in its ruling… Measures to reduce the health hazards posed by the plant have been planned since 2012, but implementation deadlines have been regularly pushed back. The EU court pointed out that the close link between the protection of the environment and human health, are key objectives of EU law.”

The story in The Guardian on March 10, 2024 reveals horrific consequences of the steelworks pollution and the toxic iron-ore dust:

“The emissions – a mix of minerals, metals and carcinogenic dioxins – infiltrated the sea, all but destroying another of the city’s economic lifelines – mussel fishing… Cancer cases climbed, but it wasn’t until 2012 that official figures showed the death rate from the disease in the area was 15% above the national average. More recent studies confirmed a link between the emissions and the prevalence of cancer as well as higher-than-average rate of respiratory, kidney and cardiovascular illnesses… A report by Sentieri, an epidemiological monitoring group, found that between 2005 and 2012, 3,000 deaths were directly linked to ‘limited environmental exposure to pollutants’. Medics say the cancer rate fluctuates in line with the factory’s output… Children have been acutely affected: a 2019 study by Italy’s higher health institute, ISS, found that in the seven years to 2012 there was almost twice the rate of childhood lymphoma in Taranto than regional averages, and a more recent study by Sentieri showed an excess of childhood cancer in the city compared with the rest of Puglia… Today, the plant employs about 8,500 people, the majority of whom travel to work from outside Taranto. The issue has caused deep divisions, between those who work there and those who suffer its effects. Murals of child cancer victims have been painted on walls across Taranto. One is of Giorgio Di Ponzio, who died aged 15.”

Mastromauro dedicated his film to Giorgio, who died due to a soft tissue sarcoma. His smiling face looks at us just before the final credits start rolling, giving us time to grasp the terrible facts we saw on the screen just seconds before that: “During a 7 years period 11.550 men, women and children died of cardiac, respiratory and cerebrovascular diseases with an average of 1.650 deaths per year. This is of one of the most serious health and environmental disasters in Italian and European history. Over 23.000 children under the age of 14 live in Taranto”.

Mastromauro and his cinematographer Sandro Chessa are curious observers with a great eye for detail, and the best thing of Bangarang (a Jamaican word meaning tumult, disorder, chaos) is that the disaster is felt rather than told – in the macabre presence of the factory chimney, the red dust that eats the buildings, playgrounds, statues, cars, and water-wells.

And yet, the disaster remains in the background as the tone – and the rhythm – of the film is set by the raw, wild and almost contagiously optimistic energy of the children of Taranto living their everyday life in full – the film’s tour de force. And as such Bangarang is truly a visual essay of innocence and carelessness amid a looming disaster.

“It is only the gay and innocent and heartless who can fly”, a quote from J. M. Barrie’s “Peter and Wendy”, is the motto of the film.

With all their sincerity, the children talk about their city, their favorite things, hopes and expectations; they even joke about being beaten up by their parents when they are naughty. A bunch of 6-9 year old girls, with long fake nails and long hair they learned to push back like the models do, all want to become “estheticians”, and can’t stop giggling when cancer is mentioned.

In one of the most shocking scenes, the kids watch a news report where a woman describes that the mineral dust is killing them, asking if they all have to die of cancer so the authorities would stop the pollution. The kids play back the news on their phone and laugh as they mock the woman’s words (mineral! ha-ha, die! ha-ha, cancer! ha-ha). 

The world will vanish in laughter, as Milan Kundera put it.

The ethereal music by Bruno Falanga acts as a connecting tissue between the shots of real life of the children juxtaposed with dreamily shot animals – a horse, dolphins, flamingos, seahorse – and altogether gives the film a sense of a fairytale. 

Structuring the film in several chapters, Mastromauro proves himself as a skilled storyteller. The story unwinds with a slow pace and the emotional impact often lingers from one scene into another. By the end, it distills into a heartwarming ode to the resilience of the innocent.

Marina Kostova
Edited by Savina Petkova
© FIPRESCI 2024