One night, a group of people living on Lampedusa went out on their boat, the Gamar, to sleep. After a few hours, they were woken up by the screams of dozens of people at sea. It was 2013, the morning of one of this century's deadliest shipwrecks in the Mediterranean.

In the hours that followed, the group of friends rescued 47 migrants.

Davide Lomma, a young filmmaker from Pesaro, met these women and men and decided to tell their stories. A documentary was thus born called 'L'ultima isola' ('The last island'), which won an award at the Biografilm in Bologna and will be self-distributed in Italian movie theatres starting in September.

"We have gathered a lot of material and carried out many interviews, but in the end we chose only one point of view, that of these friends who found themselves saving lives by coincidence and spent the following years trying to elaborate this tragedy," Lomma told ANSA.

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Rescuers spent years trying to overcome tragedy

It was an incredible wound for these people who had also migrated to Lampedusa from other areas of Sicily and even from northern Italy, said the director. "When you read about the shipwreck, the stories only focus on the accident but I wanted to focus on the human side of the story," he said.

At least 368 people died, 20 were reported missing and 155 people were rescued, one third of whom were saved by people who intervened spontaneously, sometimes using a tiny fishing vessel.

In the film, the protagonists talk freely when they remember that tragic dawn and viewers don't see even one video clip of the shipwreck itself.

The story however takes shape through the storytellers' words and emotions.

"There are many videos of that day, but I chose not to use them, I wanted to give the feeling" that protagonists were "talking around a fire, without the pornography of pain that we are served every day, even if it's an anti-commercial choice," Lomma said.

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Tragedy not ending, 11 years on

"Ever since 2017, we have returned two or three times a year to film. I was inspired by visual anthropology, I did a lot of research on the ground and, in the end, I tried to restore the point of view of the island."

The idea of 'The Last island' is of a border area as well as the last outpost seen by the thousands who have died at sea. The objective is also to spark a dialogue that focuses more on human issues than on ideology, also because the tragedy is not ending 11 years after the deadly shipwreck, noted the director.

"Even before the screening, at Biografilm, we witnessed a particularly heated debate and I want this, I want to create a discussion", said Lomma. The filmmaker said he wants screenings with a concluding discussion and "I would also like it to be included in cinema events in schools," he concluded.

Author: Chiara Venuto

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