''Mafia Inc.'' is a 2019 Canadian

crime drama film Crime film is a film belonging to the crime fiction genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and fiction. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as drama or gangster film, but al ...

directed by Podz and scripted by

Sylvain Guy Sylvain Guy is a Canadian screenwriter and film director from Quebec. He is most noted for the 2004 film ''Machine Gun Molly (film), Machine Gun Molly (Monica la mitraille)'', for which he and Luc Dionne won the Genie Award for Canadian Screen Awar ...

. Based on the non-fiction book ''Mafia Inc: The Long, Bloody Reign of Canada's Sicilian Clan'' by journalists André Cédilot and André Noël, the film stars

Marc-André Grondin Marc-André Grondin (born March 11, 1984) is a Canadian actor, known for his role as Xavier Laflamme in the 2011 ice hockey film '' Goon''. He also played Zachary Beaulieu in Jean-Marc Vallée's film '' C.R.A.Z.Y.'' (2005), for which he won a Ju ...

as Vincent Gamache, a man who gets drawn into Montreal's

organized crime Organized crime is a category of transnational organized crime, transnational, national, or local group of centralized enterprises run to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally thought of as a f ...

underground through his friendship with Giaco Paterno, the son of a major mafia boss, that started after he protected Giaco from a gang of fellow students, and was badly beaten up. Vicent is drawn into the Paterno family as the family he never had. The cast also includes

Sergio Castellitto Sergio Castellitto (born 18 August 1953) is an Italian film director, actor, and screenwriter. Biography Sergio Castellitto was born in Rome in 1953, to parents from Molise and Abruzzo, Southern Italy. After graduating from the Silvio D'Amico ...

Gilbert Sicotte Gilbert Sicotte, (born February 18, 1948) is a Canadian actor. Career Sicotte is known for roles in '' The Vultures (Les Vautours)'', ''Little Tougas (Ti-Cul Tougas)'', ''The Years of Dreams and Revolt (Les Années de rêves)'', '' The Secret ...

, Mylène Mackay, Tony Nardi and

Benz Antoine Benz Antoine (born June 22, 1972) is a Canadian actor, of Haitian descent, who has made over 100 film and television appearances. Early life and education Benz Antoine was born in 1972 in Montreal, Canada and is the oldest of the three children ...

. The film premiered in October 2019 at the

São Paulo International Film Festival The São Paulo International Film Festival (), also known internationally as Mostra, is an annual film festival held in the city of São Paulo, Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South Ame ...

, before having its Canadian premiere in February 2020. Grondin received a

Canadian Screen Award The Canadian Screen Awards () are awards given for artistic and technical merit in the film industry recognizing excellence in Canadian film, English-language television, and digital media ( web series) productions. Given annually by the Academy ...

nomination for Best Actor at the

8th Canadian Screen Awards The 8th Canadian Screen Awards were presented by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television from 25–28 May 2020 to honour achievements in Canadian film, television, and digital media production in 2019. The presentations were held as a seri ...

Plot summary

The Gamache, a family of tailors, have been dressing the Paternò Mafia family for three generations. Vincent “Vince” Gamache chooses instead to work with the Paterno family, and Frank, the godfather, puts him to work with his eldest son, Giaco. Vince, reckless and rash, seeks to earn his stripes by impressing the godfather. Working independently, Vince successfully plans and executes a big operation for the family and is promoted. Fuming with jealousy, Giaco discovers that Vince committed a monstrous act behind his back. This happens while Frank has the opportunity to get out of the family business by investing $ 180 million in the construction of a toll bridge linking Sicily to Italy. The Paterno family disown him and war begins.

Cast

Production

In February 2018 the Quebecor Fund granted $380,000 to support the production of ''Mafia Inc.'' and ''

Antigone ANTIGONE (Algorithms for coNTinuous / Integer Global Optimization of Nonlinear Equations), is a deterministic global optimization solver for general Mixed-Integer Nonlinear Programs (MINLP). History ANTIGONE is an evolution of GloMIQO, a global ...

'' by

Sophie Deraspe Sophie Deraspe (born October 27, 1973) is a Canadian director, scenarist, director of photography and producer. Prominent in new Quebec cinema, she is known for a 2015 documentary ''The Amina Profile'', an exploration of the Amina Abdallah Arraf ...

(to be divided between the two films). In May 2018

Telefilm Canada Telefilm Canada is a Canadian Crown corporation that supports Canada's audiovisual industry. Headquartered in Montreal, Telefilm Canada provides services to the Canadian audiovisual industry with four regional offices in Vancouver, British Colu ...

announced it would spend approximately $13 million to fund 10 Quebec films, including ''Mafia Inc.''

Principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as the ...

took place in Montreal and then Cuba before completing late in 2018.

Reception

Critical response

Review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

website,

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

reports that of reviews of the film were positive, with an average rating of . According to

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which sampled six critics and calculated a weighted average score of 64 out of 100, the film received "generally favorable reviews".

Accolades

References

External links

* {{Daniel Grou 2019 films Canadian crime drama films Films directed by Daniel Grou Films shot in Cuba Films shot in Montreal Films set in Montreal Mafia films Films about organized crime in Canada French-language Canadian films 2010s Canadian films Canadian gangster films