Why For Elisa – The Claps case would have a lot to teach TV lounges

We are so bombarded by the pornography of pain and by all those television programs that dig without restraint to find a detail capable of moving and shocking that we now consider the crime news as something extremely dangerous because very few are able to tell it as it should be. The tone, especially in controversial cases like that of Elisa Claps, is almost always exasperated, peppered with irritating rhetoric and, above all, with the very avoidable hot interviews with relatives and friends of the victims who suddenly find themselves with a camera pointed at them, often unable to string together two words because they are at the mercy of emotions conflicts that would be appropriate to manage privately and not live. Despite some podcasts like Investigations by Stefano Nazzi have found the right tone to tell the news, the doubt that the fiction and films concerning the most sensational cases in Italy remainsgiven that in the coming months there will be many titles that we will see in this regard, from Avetrana – This is not Hollywood on Disney+ a The city of the living on the murder of Luca Varani on Sky, passing through via Poma and the Erba massacre. However, it would be unfair to brand the genre as incorrect without reflecting on an important detail: It doesn’t matter so much what you talk about but the way and register in which you say it and, in this, For Elisa – The Elisa Claps case it is a very valid example.

For its complexity and its darkness, the case of Elisa Claps has been the subject of morbid attention for years and, above all, of a web of lies and subterfuge that did no good to anyone, neither to the family who hoped to have justice nor to Elisa’s memory. Fortunately, Rai chose to resume the story following the path of respect and delicacy, representing the story with nuances and emotions that never veer towards the forcing or intrusiveness that we often see in television lounges in the afternoon and evening. Through an unprecedented delicacy for a TV series and an extraordinary cast, which ranges from wonderful Gianmarco Saurino in the role of Gildo Claps to a very sensitive person James George in those of Luciano Clapsnot to mention the big one Giulio Della Monicavery good at interpreting Danilo Restivoi.e. the monster of this story -, the fiction about Elisa Claps directed by Marco Pontecorvo and produced by Rai Fiction and ITV Studios does public service demonstrating that there is a way to deal with crime news in Italy with dignity.

Even though we are talking about a product written and performed by actors, For Elisa – The Claps case it is much more respectful and truthful than many television programs who, taking advantage of the right to report, often go too far in spectacularization as an end in itself by participating in a more macabre retail competition to be pulled off live. The fiction, based on the book Blood on the Altar by the English writer and journalist Tobias Jones and created thanks to the consultancy of the Claps family itself, succeeds where many have failed: tell the story of Elisa Claps by showing the teenager she was and showing the tenacity and courage of a family – embodied above all by the great acting performance of Saurino, who after the farewell to DOC – In your hands he is demonstrating great talent in choosing the right roles and projects for him – that he did not give up and fought for the truth by going against everything and everyone. With family harmony still put to the test, even after thirty years, by the city of Potenza, which has always preferred to turn the other way rather than lend a hand.