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The Negotiator

Il Nibbio

ALESSANDRO TONDA
Italy, Belgium, 2025
108 minutes, Color

The Negotiator creates such an edge-of-your-seat feeling that when you realize the film is based on actual people and events, the story hits even harder. Amid the bleak chaos of the Iraq war in 2005, an Italian journalist (Sonia Bergamasco) has just been kidnapped. Among other consequences, this interrupts veteran Italian secret service agent Nicola Calipari's (Claudio Santamaria) family skiing vacation. As Calipari lands in Baghdad, Alessandro Tonda masterfully captures the deep tension of the agent's attempts to navigate the intrigue and intricacies of finding hard-to-find people who may know other people who might be trusted to offer help—and every small step along the way comes with risk and worry. Negotiating not only with terrorists but with the smug American CIA, opportunistic Sunni separatists, and even with his own family, Calipari remains relentless. The Negotiator won Best Film Award at the 2025 Italian Golden Globes (Globi d'Oro).—Dave Nuttycombe

In Italian, English, and Arabic with English subtitles