The Secret
( Il Segreto )

Cyop&Kaf
2013 - 89 min - Couleur - Italie

Many neighborhoods in Naples still celebrate the ritual of the bonfires of Saint Anthony in mid January. Kids start collecting firewood after New Year’s, sometimes venturing far from home to look for it. Every group stashes their wood in a different hiding place, "the secret", so they can protect it from being raided by other neighboring groups. Checco Lecco’s gang from the Spanish Quarters has been hiding spruces of all sizes in an abandoned site: it was cleared twenty years before when they demolished a building damaged by the 1980 earthquake. Every afternoon, the kids leave from their "secret" in small groups and head to the elegant parts of town to retrieve Christmas trees discarded after the holidays.