Italian cinema has always been my favorite cinema. Resonances of an ancestor, perhaps; childhood memories, maybe, but both interpretations minimize the value of the greatest works of that cinema, which I have enjoyed since I was 5 years old, starting with Vittorio de Sica's «The Gold of Naples».

«Una femmina» is a portentous first feature, a wonderful Calabrian drama about a rebellious woman, in a setting of rival families and predation, which is today the modern equivalent of a classical tragedy. The Romans were warriors and learned the dramatic art from the Greeks, without ever mastering the art of making tragedies. In the meantime, they gave us the "commedia dell'arte", whose comics taught practically all of Europe how to perform, and invented opera and melodrama in an attempt to revive tragedy, not realizing that their Mediterranean dramas contained the same intense passion of the Greek neighbors they had conquered.

Such fiery spirit, with a fetid smell of death that seems to hook them like vice, dominates this story of a cursed Calabria, the region of quarrels, vendettas, camorras, dons, and padrones, related to other strong, similar contemporary works, such as Matteo Garrone's «Gomorra» (2008) and Jonas Carpignano's «A Ciambra» (2017). Far away are its protagonists from their "heirs", the violent, yet mannered mob bosses from New York and Chicago. Here is the strain, the pure lineage of crime, with a young woman who takes them on a personal vendetta to free a village, regardless of the consequences.

Beautiful images by Giuseppe Maio, redundantly effective music by Valerio Camporini Faggioni, Lina Siciliano's solid performance as Rosa, and Mario Russo's manly voice as her lover Gianni, who coos her with his songs, add up to a magnificent audiovisual experience that is not lacking in magical realism, based on Lirio Abbate's book «Fimmine ribelli. Come le donne salveranno il paese dalla n'drangheta» (Rebel Women. How Women Will Save the Region from the N'drangheta).

N'drangheta: Italian criminal organization, whose predominant area of action is Calabria.

The young woman protagonist is not a 'rebel', she's a psycho -- the kind of person you don't want to know because you can never be sure what, at the blink of an eye, outrageous or bizarre action she'll perform next. All those who want / try to get close to her end up in a bad way. Another reviewer said something about the magnificent final scene -- but it's just a charade: march in the parade, sing your song (literally; cf. Informers 'singing' to the police) -- and then run away to Witness Protection. This picture is much too understated for the point(s) it presumably wants to make.

A young woman's rebellion against her own family and against 'ndrangheta: this puzzling land called Calabria's own mafia.

A must see for the crime-drama genre lovers: depicting a secluded village run by the nowadays arguabily most powerful criminal organization WW. Unglamorous, gritty, showing the sickness (and the weakness?) of this primitive world founded on ignorance, family, violence, silence and male chauvinism.

Up there with the best on this subject (e.g. The less original/visionary but possibly more solid plotwise "Anime nere") it's obvious the craftsmanship and the care of the production (it's the directors' full length debut).

Great cinematography, music and at least a dozen of powerful, hypnotic and even horror sequences and scenes. In particular the female protagonist has a unique and extremely expressive black-eyed gaze of defiance (which I guess she could have used a little less often).

Indeed unfortunately paired with this visual poetry I found some problems with a lot of dialogues: too slow and static or weirdly delivered. Hard to tell if it's the director's or the actors' fault. Still the result is that the level of tension falls and with it the suspension of disbelief necessary for the drama to work.

Finally: no words can adeguately make justice of the marvellous final scene; I guess that watching it at the cinema (which I couldn't do) must be a blast. Would be a 7 otherwise.