Santiago, Italia

Nanni Moretti's documentary about what happened in Chile after the coup of 11 September 1973. In the aftermath hundreds of people faced arrest or death. The Italian embassy in Santiago opened its doors and sheltered people in the building for months. In the end the embassy arranged for them to travel to Italy. The documentary is built from the accounts of those who lived through it. Among the speakers are people who stayed in the embassy, people who settled in Italy, and diplomats and journalists of the period. Its second line is what came after: how these people were received in Italy, how they found work, how they stayed. Moretti makes a comparison here and states it plainly: the acceptance shown then looks very different when placed beside today's argument about migration. Archive footage from the period of the coup is also used. At one point Moretti says directly that he is not impartial; that line is the film's most cited moment. A valuable record for anyone who likes documentary and recent history. For a viewer expecting a comprehensive historical account, the film concentrates on a narrow event and does not tell the general history of the coup.