Death of a Neapolitan Mathematician

Naples, 1959. Renato Caccioppoli is a professor of pure mathematics living out his last days. He has just come out of a psychiatric hospital; his wife has left him; he has broken with both the university and the Communist Party. The film follows his last week: walking the streets, sitting in cafés, talking with old friends, teaching and drinking. Caccioppoli was a real person, known in Italy both as a mathematician and for his anti-fascist stance; on his mother's side he was Bakunin's grandson. Mario Martone's first feature films him not as a genius but as a man who is finished, and explains nothing. Carlo Cecchi plays Caccioppoli; Toni Servillo is in the cast at the start of his career. The film won the Silver Lion at Venice in 1992. The tone is heavy and keeps its distance; Naples is not a set but part of the man's condition.