THE KINGDOM (LE ROYAUME) Discovery

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director and writer Julien Colonna.

Coming-of-age meets organized crime in Julien Colonna’s spellbinding feature debut, which premiered at Cannes. This gritty father-daughter tale unfolds against the backdrop of the criminal and political violence that gripped Corsica during the 1990s. Fifteen-year-old Lesia (phenomenal newcomer Ghjuvanna Benedetti) is in the midst of a typical teen summer in her remote rural town when she is suddenly hurried away to a villa on another part of the island where her father, local crime boss Pierre-Paul (Saveriu Santucci), has been hiding out with his clan, preparing for an impending underworld war involving escalating blood feuds and political scheming. Eschewing the tropes of mafia dramas immemorial, THE KINGDOM reframes the story from the vantage of a young woman who is initially one step removed from the actuality of mob violence, but gradually drawn into its nasty, unglamorous heart. When father and daughter are forced to go on the run, Lesia must quickly adapt, coming to terms with her father’s chosen path while finding herself entangled in a seemingly inescapable cycle of generational violence. THE KINGDOM puts a distinctly fresh spin on the classic crime genre, heralding an exciting new voice in world cinema. –Abbie Algar