“Salvo” screened as a part of the Chicago International Film Festival. This early review is merely an impression of the version screened. It does not yet have an American release.
Would you recognize a miracle when you saw one? We view miracles on a grand scale, and they probably happen every day without many people noticing. It’s not quite what they mean when they say “miracles come in small packages,” but the mini-miracle of “Salvo” is that it strips away virtually all of its story telling or character embellishments and discovers something special through senses alone.
“Salvo” is an Italian mob film that premiered this year at Cannes. It’s immediately a misleading label, as the film is without action or any sort of mafia family plot structure for its entirety.
After being ambushed and almost killed, a nameless assassin (Saleh Bakri) discovers who arranged his murder and hides out in his home to kill him.
Awaiting him is a blind girl named Rita (Sara Serraiocco). She never leaves the home and spends time listening to pop songs and counting money. Agonizing minutes go by as the assassin sneaks out of Rita’s way, the camera playing close to the chest and the back of the head to create palpable trepidation and tension. But just as he’s killed Rita’s companion and held her, blinding light suddenly comes from her perspective, and for the first time we get a glimpse of our mobster’s face.
She can see, although not clearly yet. “Salvo” plays with the idea that someone being given sight for the first time in their life may take significant time to adjust to massive amounts of light their eyes have never known.
The assassin locks her in an abandoned warehouse as she gains her eyesight back, and the resulting film is essentially a love story between two people in need, one of them trying to escape the world they’re in, the other being forced to discover it.
“Salvo” in a way reminds of “Only God Forgives,” a slight tale of redemption told through style and sensory imagery alone. Both films are expertly made, but directors Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza have a fascinating way of depicting sounds and sights through pure minimalism rather than Nicolas Winding Refn’s opulence.
“Salvo” is sinister and arresting when it wants to be, but it’s awfully thin as a result. What little there is to latch on to in terms of character and ideology is something the intimate, tense and measured aesthetic can’t make up for.
3 stars