Hands Over the City

A building collapses in Naples just before a city council election, and Edoardo Nottola (Rod Steiger), a land developer who also sits on the council, has to answer for it. He and his political backers close ranks, while the idealist De Vita pushes to expose how the poor were cleared out for profit. Francesco Rosi films the council chambers and committee hearings in a flat, documentary manner, as if recording what happened.