In Detail

At 16, Paolo Sorrentino returned home to find that both his parents were dead, killed by a carbon monoxide leak. On the night of the tragedy, Sorrentino was inside a football stadium, watching Diego Maradona play for his local team, Napoli. Afterwards, he would say – not wholly joking – that Maradona saved his life.

'The Hand of God', no surprise, is Sorrentino’s most nakedly personal film to date, almost to a fault in the way it jettisons the cool distance of ‘The Great Beauty’ or ‘Il Divo’ in favour of a sweaty, close-up evocation of youth.

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