Italy’s Oscar-nominated ‘Io Capitano’ is a ‘flawless’ achievement and ‘authentic at every step’ [Review Round-Up]

Vincent Mandile
·4 min read
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On February 23, 2024, Cohen Media Group released “Io Capitano” in the United States, Italy’s Oscar-nominated Best International Feature film directed by Matteo Garrone. The movie is a Homeric fairy tale that tells the adventurous journey of two young boys, Seydou (Seydou Sarr) and Moussa (Moustapha Fall), who leave Dakar to reach Europe. The 2024 Oscars contender has received widespread acclaim from critics, scoring a perfect 100% freshness rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

The critics consensus reads, “A journey toward hope, ‘Io Capitano’ perambulates through the ravishing Saharan landscape encountering the most sublime and debased corners of humanity.” The castings, under the direction of Henri-Didier Njikam, took place on the African continent and features mostly newcomers. Read our full review round-up below. 

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Damon Wise of Deadline says, “Despite its technical elegance — and the film is near flawless in that respect — the biggest achievement in Garrone’s film is its casting. Using non-professionals found in an open call, it is authentic at every step of its audacious journey.” Adding, “Director of photography Paolo Carnera — who also shot the luminous ‘Adagio’ — captures all this with stunning, immersive immediacy, vividly rendering the romantic beauty of the desert, despite the human cost of its deadly siren call. There are flashes of magic realism, too, as when Seydou tries to save the life of a woman who simply cannot take another step, or the time he summons the witchdoctor to tell his mother he loves her.”

Leslie Felperin of The Hollywood Reporter praises the film, stating, “Working for the first time with cinematographer Paolo Carnera (‘The White Tiger’) and venturing far beyond the Italian settings of most of his features, Garrone (‘Dogman,’ ‘Tale of Tales,’ ‘Gomorrah’) circles back here to an exploration of the immigrant experience he first delved into with ‘Land in Between’ (1996) at the beginning of his career. Only this time, Garrone can command a budget that accommodates a transcontinental shoot, scores of characters and background artists, and challenging sea and desert locations, all of which convey the daunting vastness of the distance traveled. Still, while the landscapes, especially in the parched Sahara section of the story, are dazzling, Carnera’s camera always keeps the focus on the humans, sometimes specks seen from great distances moving through the sand and sometimes studied in close-ups that fill the widescreen canvas.”

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Guy Lodge of Variety notes, “For Garrone, this proves an energizing shift in focus, yielding his most robust, purely satisfying filmmaking since his international breakthrough with ‘Gomorrah’ 15 years ago.” Continuing, “Shorn of the splashy formal trickery that has marked such outings as his media satire ‘Reality’ and the adult folklore of ‘Tale of Tales,’ ‘Me Captain’ is surprisingly classical in construction and style, wisely guiding our attention away from its sure directorial touch and toward the story at hand — pieced together by a small army of screenwriters and collaborating contributors from first-hand migrant accounts.”

Leila Latif of IndieWire writes, “Garrone’s film has a three-dimensional and devastatingly realized human soul at its core. The world could do with paying attention to Seydou’s story and the millions of other real ones like it.” Concluding, “Sembene himself once said, ‘Europe is not my center. Why be a sunflower and turn towards the sun? I myself am the sun.’ And while globalization, capitalism, and the legacy of colonialism may make our protagonists consider Europe as the promised land, Garrone does not betray Sembene’s perspective, with the continent and its inhabitants being the sun towards which we should all turn. Our hero is not superhuman, and nor is he an embodiment of the ideal refugee or a narrative vessel to simply endure all the world’s cruelty.”

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