Few drama series are so strong that they can afford to kill of their leading characters without losing their essence; but 'The Wire' managed it, and so did Italian drama series 'Gomorra', which dispatched Ciro di Marzo at the end of series three. 'L'Immortale' is a spin-off movie, centred on Ciro; needless to say, there's a major but necessary plot twist right at the film's start, with the action soon displaced to Latvia, away from Naples where a Ciro-free series four unfolded. The mood is familliar but the pace is slower than in 'Gomorra', which already had a story where Ciro was working in eastern Europe which was covered in just one episode. It also seems to be that actor Marco d'Amore, so riveting under the direction of others, seems slighly mono-dimensionsal now he's directing himself. And the full complexity of the Neapolitan mafia politics in the original is echoed here only in a simplified form. I still enjoyed the movie, but in some senses Ciro had to die: his narrative arc was already complete. I haven't seen series five yet; should he reappear in Naples, it will be interesting to see what kind of place they find for him in the story.
Review of The Immortal
