Aspromonte, la terra degli ultimi: a different playgorund
The church in front of which Andrea (Grillo) plays football with two friends is the Church of San Nicola, one of the few buildings left standing in the abandoned village of Africo Vecchio (Africo, RC).
PLOT
In Africo, a small town perched in the Aspromonte valley of Calabria, in the late 1950s, a woman dies in childbirth because the doctor cannot get there in time and because there is no connecting road. The men, exasperated by the state of neglect, go to protest to the mayor. They get the promise of a doctor, but in the meantime, led by Peppe (Francesco Colella), they decide to unite and build a road themselves. Everyone, including the children, gives up their usual occupations to accomplish the work. Giulia, the new elementary school teacher (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi), comes from the North, and wants to teach Italian “if Africo is going to enter the world thanks to the road, the children will have to know it first, learning to read and write.” But for the brigand Don Totò, the one who dictates the real law, Africo cannot really become an 'Italian' town....