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In 1946, the American justice system did the Mafia a huge favor.
It returned to Italy, his place of birth, Salvatore Lucania,
also known as Charles "Lucky" Luciano, the king of the New York crime world.
In 1936 he was sentenced to 50 years in prison,
on charges brought against him by Prosecuting Attorney Thomas E. Dewey.
After 9 years he was granted a pardon for:
"special services rendered to the United States Armed Forces",
by Dewey, who was then the Governor of New York State.
Come on, andiamo!
See you soon.
Excuse me, I've to go to the washroom.
You can't imagine how I feel.
Hurrah! Here's to Charlie!
You must always stay on the side of power.
Only by doing this can you be in control of your world,
exactly as you want it.
For a man to be a man he must pull the strings.
I'd say he has to be a man of peace.
5 months after the elimination of Joe Masseria,
on the night of 11th September 1931,
known as the Night of the Sicilian Vespers,
40 bosses were killed, from one side of the United States to the other.
The man who planned the extermination of the old Mafia was Lucky Luciano,
who then became the boss of bosses.
Sour Sicily
The blood you gave me is all red
When I was young I went far away
Lonely and disheartened in this world
My beautiful mother
When you died you broke my heart
But my land will never abandon me
Wrap me in your arms like the sea
Thank you very much.
I was a free man in America,
and I'll be a free man in Italy too.
Even if I don't intend staying there very long.
Maybe I'll go back through Mexico.
But please, don't make me wait another 9 years.
Here are 200,000 dollars. We're here to help you anyway we can.
Che cazzo vuole?
We're just having a party.
Mi dispiace, I can't drink.
- You're Italian. - Sì.
It's all right, he's one of us.
I'm one of you. My parents are from Altavilla Irpino, near Avellino.
Can I do something for you?
Is your family in Italy?
Can I send them your greetings? Would you like a promotion?
Sure, a promotion.
But how... How could you? They're shipping you to Italy.
Don't worry. That's my business.
Hopefully.
My apologies, your Excellency. I'm a little late.
- He came to see where he was born. - The poor man.
The poor woman, three of her sons have been murdered this year.
AN INNOCENT VICTIM OF A CRUEL AND RUTHLESS HAND
KILLED BY THE HANDS OF A SINNNER LEAVING BEHIND A DESOLATE WIFE
DEDICATED HIS LIFE TO WORKERS' RIGHTS AND SOCIALISM
INNOCENT VICTIM OF A CRUEL KILLER
MURDERED BY A CRUEL UNKNOWN KILLER
AN HONEST HARDWORKING MAN
INNOCENTLY MURDERED IN HIS YOUTH
Are you Luciano?
You're not Italian, sir?
Kind of.
Do you like Naples?
I like the sea.
One spaghetti marinara!
Salute the Colonel!
Jim, I don't like your friend. Bring me a new one tomorrow.
My boyfriend will kill me if he catches me with another American soldier.
Tranquilla, these guys get too drunk to even try anything.
We only made one mistake in Sicily, Genovese: we were too nice!
It's true!
The Colonel requests the collaboration of all citizens,
to put an end to this shameful black marketing.
All offenders will be severely punished.
Strict rationing will be imposed,
to fairly ensure that
the American people's help reaches the Italian people.
Long live America! Long live Italy!
Black as eggplants!
- Good afternoon! - Hello, Don Vito.
Don Vito!
Vito, what'll we do with the blacks?
Sell them on the black market.
What's yours like? Is it like this one?
Like this? No, like this!
That's how you blackmail countries you say you're trying to help.
Gentlemen, here's Lucky Luciano.
So, what do you want to know?
- Where have you been until now? - Did you leave Italy?
- Who gave you a passport? - Were you arrested?
Slow down, one at a time.
Were you in control of the gaming houses in Cuba?
Let's all be seated.
Take a seat.
Recently, they were talking about you and drugs at the UN.
It's the Narcotics Bureau that's always talking about drugs!
- And that Esslinger. - Anslinger!
Henry Anslinger, Head of the Narcotics Bureau.
Esslinger. He's a Protestant, a German policeman.
If a gangster is gunned down, it's Luciano's fault.
If the Queen of England gets divorced, it's Luciano's fault.
If there's a party and people are having fun,
then of course there must be drugs involved.
That's right.
And it's Luciano's fault!
But for everyone, Lucky Luciano is synonymous with drugs.
I don't use them.
But the scandal, Mr Lucania, all the papers are writing about it.
They've discussed it in the United States Congress and Senate.
It's all political.
In America they had to elect a new president.
Dewey, a Republican, was the strongest candidate,
and so the Democrats kept saying
that he had pardoned me.
He pardoned you for helping the American Army.
Were you parachuted in Sicily in 1943?
I've never seen Sicily from the skies, not even from an airplane.
I go there by boat sometimes,
but only to Palermo, where I have a sweet factory.
Yes, the chocolates.
Candy.
I go there to get some sun, like in Capri.
What about counterfeiting? Since you've returned,
Sicily has become the capital of bootleg cigarettes.
Look, I smoke legal cigarettes.
I'm the only one in Naples who doesn't smoke bootleg cigarettes.
Why, which do you smoke?
There's no proof against me.
If there was the slightest proof,
I'd be in prison within the hour.
Why don't the Americans ask for my extradition?
I'm prepared to go back, even handcuffed,
to personally defend myself.
So you really want to return to America! Don't you like Italy?
I grew up in America.
I lived there a free man for 30 years.
I was unjustly condemned:
false evidence, corrupt witnesses, prostitutes...
They didn't respect the rules.
But here, in Italy...
it's an endless persecution. There are no rules.
Here they don't even know what a "caution" is.
But you had a previous record.
Just fines.
I didn't stop for red lights when I was running moonshine.
During prohibition...
Prohibition! Another invention of those Jesuits like Esslinger.
People wanted to drink.
Somebody had to give them something to drink.
If we didn't do it, the government wouldn't have lasted!
You were performing a service to society!
Exactly, a service to society.
That's why we sided with Roosevelt.
He understood that many things had to change,
and so we gave him our vote at the Chicago convention.
So you like politics. Don't you like Italian politics?
This is a poor country.
What kind of politics exist without big businesses?
Why, are your businesses in Italy not doing well?
On the sweet factory in Palermo alone I've already lost 10,000 dollars.
How do you manage to survive?
You spend a lot of money. You bet huge amounts at the races!
As I already explained to the finance police,
I receive a little help from my friends in New York.
Even my car was a present from them.
I'm not rich.
But your high standard of living? Your bodyguards?
What bodyguards? The police are always watching me.
Of course, you're always on the move. Rome, Milan...
- They even gave you a passport. - You went abroad...
I am a free man!
The American Government pardoned me.
That said, when I go to Capri the head of Interpol is there.
He looks after my security.
Do you think the Americans could let someone like Lucky Luciano
circulate freely in their country?
I can go back to America with my head held high,
and I have to go back there.
I have already prepared
a family tomb in Brooklyn for when I die.
Shove it up your ass.
I don't like puttane.
Salute!
Well, fuck me!
Portate le valigie in camera mia.
Are you sure you would've been the master?
You know, Gene, I don't like travelling.
Even in America, I always kept to my own patch.
Sometimes during winter I'd go to Florida for a holiday.
But always to where I knew somebody.
Here too, I'm always in Naples.
Sometimes Sicily.
Where I was born.
Or Milan, for the horses.
Whoever comes here to visit me comes to enjoy themselves.
You don't come here to work.
You come here as a tourist.
- Contrabbando. - What?
"For three months now I've been rotting away in a cell without windows,
behind an iron door.
No air and no light.
The heat and mosquitoes are eating me alive.
There are six of us, and all of us have to do our business in the same spot,
and put up with the stench, night and day.
There isn't even room enough to move around,
and we can't all sleep at the same time.
One of us has to stay awake to guard against the rats.
They're hungry enough and big enough to attack us.
The bedbugs are as big as cockroaches.
I have to pay to get a little water,
or some straw to sleep on.
It will cost me 50 dollars just to get this letter to you.
A warm embrace, etc."
Italy is full of misery.
Even the prisons are dreadful.
But even in Italy there are big deals to be made.
I tried with Gene,
but what I really need is a man like you.
Listen to me!
If you want to see the opera at San Carlo,
or the horses at the racetrack,
if you want to enjoy yourself, I'm here.
I'm not doing any deals.
This is another of Gene's letters.
In it he talks about you, Joe Pici and Frank Callace.
This letter could ruin you for good.
I'm supposed to give it to Siragusa. Instead, I'm giving it to you.
You have to trust me. Here, tear it up!
You're supposed to give it to Siragusa?
Then give it to him.
Want to have a bet with me?
Thanks, I prefer to place my own bets.
Stop!
Hey, get off the road!
May I have a word?
Okay. So what was that scuffle at the racetrack about?
International organization, drugs, killers...
We know all about these things, but evidence is another matter.
This man hardly ever moves from Naples.
He walks his dog every morning, he bets on horses at the track...
After what you just told us, we'll try not to let him go there again.
He's nice to everyone, he donates to charitable works,
he's polite with intrusive journalists, and even some policemen too.
If you discuss his past with the police all you hear is:
"Yes, we know he was found guilty of aiding and abetting prostitution.
But what kind of crime is that?
If a woman prostitutes herself, it means she's a whore.
We can't arrest a man for a crime he committed 20 years ago."
If he commits a crime in Italy,certainement...
If all that's true, then he really is a most extraordinary man.
One thing is certain: since Luciano returned to Italy,
the Mafia has been controlling all drug trafficking.
A business worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
And so why aren't we able to arrest him?
From the proceedings of the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry
on the Mafia phenomenon in Sicily:
"In October 1957,
there took place in Palermo a series of high level meetings
between Italian-American and Sicilian Mafiosi.
The meetings were presided over by Lucky Luciano.
The aim of the meetings was to develop Sicily
into a transit zone for trafficking drugs directly into North America.
Giuseppe Bonanno, also known as Joe Bananas, born in Sicily,
American citizen, boss of the New York "family",
had come to Palermo to agree a unified strategy
between Cosa Nostra and the Sicilian Mafia,
and to arrange, the Mafia meeting to be held
one month later in the Appalachian Mountains, New York.
The head of the Sicilian Mafia, Giuseppe Genco Russo,
participated in the Palermo meetings
to guarantee respect for the pacts,
as well as the order of rank of the island's traffickers.
9 years later, 17 alleged Mafia bosses
were prosecuted for criminal conspiracy.
However, only 5 of them were found guilty:
Camillo Galante,
Giuseppe Scandaliato,
Giuseppe Genco Russo,
John Bonventre,
Joe Bananas."
To a hundred years good health!
Out of the way, boys, let me through.
Didn't you go inside? Didn't you hear mass?
I heard it from here.
I would have caused a distraction inside.
You do know you have to see the priest? Otherwise it doesn't count.
It's as though I saw you.
Fr Ciccio, you care about me.
You never ask me anything.
Since Igea's death,
I've needed people like you near me.
Listen, Lucky,
between donations and the cost of the hospital, I'm full of debts.
I have friends who can
get me these machines from Germany. The sort you find in bars.
They say you put in 100 lire and 1,000 lire come out, even 5,000.
What do you think?
Fr Ciccio, I was in America.
Leave those machines alone.
They're not for you.
- Who's there? - Flying Squad, open up!
I'll open up.
- Is Salvatore Lucania here? - He's in bed.
- Tell him we want to have a word. - This way, please.
He's waiting.
Good evening. We have to carry out a search.
- Is the young man with you? - Yes, he's one of our men.
Can I offer something to drink? A whiskey?
No, we don't drink on duty.
Then you can search.
Watch, I'll find something straight away.
What's this?
I have a license.
What's your name?
I'm Marshal Schioppa.
You're an intelligent man.
I'm taking this telegram.
Take it if you want.
You have to come with us.
The Captain of the Finance Police wants to question you.
What? At this hour?
Yes, at this hour.
Do you want to tell me what this telegram means?
I've been telling you all night.
- What else can I say? - Let's go over it again.
Read us the statement again.
"I hereby state that in Spain
I know one Martin Gosch, an America living in Madrid,
with whom I agreed to the drafting of a screenplay
for a film production based on my life story.
Gosch telegrammed to tell me he was landing at Naples airport today,
to return the screenplay to me. I had signed the screenplay,
but now want to take it out of circulation."
Is that how it is?
Tell us everything you did yesterday after receiving the telegram.
He knows everything.
He was watching me all day.
It's better if you tell us. Let's start from the beginning.
"On the 25th of this month, at approximately one o'clock,
I was in the California Restaurant, Via Santa Lucia.
I had lunch with a friend, Giuseppe Di Giorgio, recently returned to Naples
after escaping from Cuba, where he was a croupier.
As we ate we were joined by my friend Francesco Scimone, known as Chico,
the owner of a bar in Taormina.
Chico had just returned from Spain,
where he had gone to with the Rubino couple from Miami."
Your friends travel a lot, don't they?
It's some coincidence. The tourist trade between the United States and Sicily
has taken off since you settled here in Naples.
And now there's this craze for bullfighting.
From Cuba, from Taormina, from Miami,
everybody's going through Spain, then they meet you in Naples,
and afterwards leave again for New York.
Isn't that how it is?
If you say so.
"At approximately two o'clock I left Chico who was driving to Sicily,
and I went to the races at Agnano.
At the races I met my friend Pasquale Eboli, also known as "Pat Ryan"."
Eboli is from Scisciano.
Near here.
He comes to Naples every so often.
It takes him half an hour.
Then he too leaves for Spain to work on a film.
That's why he's known as "Pat Ryan", like an actor.
Siragusa always says that the drugs business is like in the cinema.
Siragusa is an asshole.
Siragusa likes you. He's always talking about you.
Siragusa is an asshole.
Tell him I said that.
Siragusa and you are alike. He talks like you and he acts like you.
Between him and you, we haven't had a moment's peace in Italy for ten years.
Charlie Siragusa is Sicilian, like me.
So is the State Prosecutor in Palermo.
Scaglione.
So is the Head of the Police. All Sicilian.
And like everybody else,
I mind my own business and don't bother anyone.
Only a rabid dog like him would get these ideas into his head.
He was right about the Canepa bros. We caught them red handed.
And we'll arrest those in Spain too.
And sooner or later, we'll get you too.
The Canepa brothers thing was a ruse of Charlie Siragusa's.
They had been arrested three months earlier,
then a judge in Rome set them free...
Anyway, it's nothing to do with me.
But your partner was involved in it, Antonino Sorci.
We have the paperwork!
Together they had a holding company in Rome.
Where's the proof? You need a notary to set up a company.
We found the notary. The same one you used in Palermo,
to buy the Orleans Park along with Sorci and Mancino.
Is buying land a crime now?
More than 160,000 square meters,
and all of it zoned for construction by Palermo City Council.
If it was zoned by the Council, then it's all above board.
Even the University bought some of it.
As well as a Christian Democrat minister.
Things have changed, Charlie Lucky,
if you think you can hide behind politicians now,
you're fooling yourself
What politicians?
Here in Naples, I don't even know the Chief of Police.
I was involved in politics in America.
Face to face with President Roosevelt.
Let's forget about President Roosevelt,
and go back to your friend Pasquale Eboli.
"Eboli has a barbershop in New York with his brother,
and another business. I don't remember exactly what kind."
Have you remembered what kind of business it is?
"Eboli wanted to talk to me about an important producer of Formica,
and about opening a chain of shops in major Italian cities.
With Chico Scimone we talked about opening a club in Rome,
on behalf of the Rubinos who have returned from Miami
with the profits from their business.
I can't remember exactly what kind of business."
Let's see if I can help you.
Is it a factory
like the one you opened in Palermo in '46 with Vizzini,
which he dismantled one night before vanishing with three tons of sweets?
Or a canned sardine factory, like Nick Gentile's?
Or a cheese factory, like the one Carlos Marcello had in Tunis?
Or a tomato factory, like Profaci's Mama Mia Importing Company in New York?
Or maybe it was a soup factory, vegetable soup for exportation,
like the one Frank Coppola had in Pomezia?
A shipment full of heroin left Pomezia for Castellammare del Golfo.
Do you think I'm an idiot?
We've arrested 40 people, in Italy and in America.
We've caught them red handed, loaded with dollars and drugs.
All your friends.
Only three escaped to Spain,
because American judges released them with a caution.
Those Americans and their cautions!
Since they arrived in Spain you've been receiving calls and telegrams
from Madrid and Barcelona.
Then you meet friends by chance at the races or in a restaurant,
and talk about Formica, dance halls, horses...
What's wrong?
Do you feel unwell?
Do you want a coffee?
I don't drink coffee. I don't smoke anymore. A glass of water, please.
Get him a drink of water.
Your friends gave you some fine scars, didn't they?
My friends didn't give me those.
That was the cops, the New York Police.
Anyway, scars don't cause problems.
I have plenty of them.
I've had two heart attacks.
May I go to the washroom?
I'll accompany you.
Once, in America...
you gave an address.
The police found a safe full of heroin there.
That time, I told what I knew.
Today, I don't know anything.
You can talk to me.
I have my own ideas about you.
And they're different than Siragusa's.
It would help you.
No, it would help you. To further your career.
You, Esslinger, Siragusa,
the generals, the head of the police.
It would help the politicians.
To distract the people,
those who don't know anything, and will never understand anything.
The politicians, when it suits them,
are happy to use criminals and Mafiosi, as you call them.
I'm sorry, I can't help you.
Let him sign the statement, then take him to meet the American.
Will we bring both of them in?
If you find drugs. If not,
confiscate the screenplay and send it to Siragusa.
At last, like new again. You looked like a corpse before.
Take a look.
Please, stand back.
Quick, call a doctor.
Translation: Eoghan Price
Subtitles: L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna