A familiar but arrestingly visceral crime story with a coming-of-age twist, Claudio Giovannesi’s Piranhas has an unusual relationship with its own predictability.
Piranhas(La paranza dei bambini)
✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
Italy · 2019
1h 51m
Director Claudio Giovannesi
Starring Francesco Di Napoli, Artem Tkachuk, Viviana Aprea, Pasquale Marotta
Genre Crime, Drama
Add to Watchlist
Please login to add films to your watchlist.
15-year-old Nicola lives with his mother and younger brother in a Naples, a place controlled by the Camorra mafia for centuries. Dreaming of a life of luxury, Nicola and his friends begin to sell drugs, exposing them to a violent world of crime that threatens their innocence, relationships, and safety.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
The Hollywood Reporter by Deborah Young
The screenplay struggles to rise above the level of a sociological study into the realm of exciting cinema.
The New York Times by Glenn Kenny
In its reliance on a conventional narrative through-line, it’s more reminiscent of “The Public Enemy” than “Goodfellas” in spite of its stylings of contemporary cinematic realism.
To watch young people fall into old patterns is still to watch those old patterns, and the film cannot escape the familiarity of its archetypal, rise-to-power, fall-from-grace narrative.
Piranhas feels a bit like a teen movie that just happens to have a Cammora backdrop, rather than a serious, nuanced drama about the paranza system – essentially, the grooming of underage kids as drug runners and Mafia footsoldiers.
The Film Stage by Leonardo Goi
There is something so perceptive in the way Giovannesi zeroes in on these embryonic mafia bosses–especially as Piranhas ventures into the kids’ relationship with the adult world around them–which makes for an enjoyable if patchy 105-minute ride.
Washington Post by Michael O'Sullivan
Piranhas is no documentary, but it plays out with a deadpan style that is deeply unsettling.
Claudio Giovannesi’s film is more an interesting tweak of Goodfellas than an eye-opening social statement.
The Guardian by Peter Bradshaw
Giovannesi’s movie is watchable enough, but often looks like a smoothed-out, planed-down version of Garrone’s Gomorrah: Gomorrah without the rough edges, like a classy television version.
RogerEbert.com by Vikram Murthi
Piranhas generally succeeds whenever it leans into its hangout vibe. The teenage gang isn’t particularly memorable (names and personalities are eschewed for rowdy homogeneity) but their collective energy can be fun to watch, especially because it allows Giovannesi to document youth as currently lived.
Users who liked this film also liked
I Want You
(Ho voglia di te)
- ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2007
- Director Luis Prieto
- Cast Riccardo Scamarcio, Laura Chiatti, Katy Louise Saunders, Susy Laude, Maria Chiara Augenti, Giulia Elettra Gorietti
- Genre Romance, Comedy
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Different from Whom?
(Diverso da chi?)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2009
- Director Umberto Riccioni Carteni
- Cast Luca Argentero, Claudia Gerini, Filippo Nigro, Francesco Pannofino, Giuseppe Cederna, Antonio Catania
- Genre Comedy
- Available on No streaming locations found.
The New Monsters
(I nuovi mostri)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 1977
- Director Ettore Scola, Mario Monicelli, Dino Risi
- Cast Alberto Sordi, Vittorio Gassman, Ugo Tognazzi, Ornella Muti, Eros Pagni, Luigi Diberti
- Genre Comedy
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Faster, Faster
(Deprisa, deprisa)
Angela begins to hang around with Pablo and his gang of young robbers.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Spain, France • 1981
- Director Carlos Saura
- Cast Berta Socuellamos Zarco, José Antonio Valdelomar , Jesús Arias, José María Hervás, María del Mar Serrano, Consuelo Pascual
- Genre Crime, Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel, Amazon Video
Pereira Declares
(Sostiene Pereira)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy, France, Portugal • 1995
- Director Roberto Faenza
- Cast Marcello Mastroianni, Stefano Dionisi, Nicoletta Braschi, Daniel Auteuil, Joaquim de Almeida, Marthe Keller
- Genre Drama
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Small World
(Je n'ai rien oublié)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- France, Germany • 2010
- Director Bruno Chiche
- Cast Gérard Depardieu, Alexandra Maria Lara, Niels Arestrup, Nathalie Baye, Yannick Renier, Françoise Fabian
- Genre Drama
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Ali Blue Eyes
(Alì ha gli occhi azzurri)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2012
- Director Claudio Giovannesi
- Cast Nader Sarhan, Stefano Rabatti, Marian Valenti Adrian, Brigitte Abruzzesi, Marco Conidi, Alessandra Roca
- Genre
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Le Week-End
A long-married British couple attempts to enliven their marriage by traveling to Paris for the first time since their honeymoon.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- United Kingdom, France • 2013
- Director Roger Michell
- Cast Jim Broadbent, Lindsay Duncan, Jeff Goldblum, Olly Alexander, Brice Beaugier
- Genre Comedy, Drama
- Available on Amazon Prime Video, Fandor Amazon Channel, OVID, Amazon Prime Video with Ads, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube, Tubi TV, VUDU Free, Kanopy, Hoopla, Plex, Plex Channel
22 Minutes
(22 минуты)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Russia • 2014
- Director Vasily Serikov
- Cast Vladimir Blagoy, Vladislav Demin, Aleksandr Galibin, Petr Korolev
- Genre Crime, Action
- Available on Amazon Video, Tubi TV, The Roku Channel
Non c'è 2 senza te
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2015
- Director Massimo Cappelli
- Cast Fabio Troiano, Dino Abbrescia, Belén Rodríguez, Tosca D'Aquino, Cristina Serafini, Giuseppe Antignati
- Genre Comedy
- Available on Google Play Movies, YouTube
PASSION
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 2008
- Director Ryusuke Hamaguchi
- Cast Aoba Kawai, Ryuta Okamoto, Kiyohiko Shibukawa, Fusako Urabe, Nao Okabe
- Genre Drama
- Available on MUBI, MUBI Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube
Jessica Forever
- ✭ ✭
- France • 2019
- Director Caroline Poggi, Jonathan Vinel
- Cast Aomi Muyock, Sebastian Urzendowsky, Augustin Raguenet, Lukas Ionesco, Paul Hamy, Eddy Suiveng
- Genre Drama, Fantasy, Science Fiction
- Available on Shudder, Shudder Amazon Channel, AMC+, AMC+ Amazon Channel, AMC Plus Apple TV Channel , Shudder Apple TV Channel, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube
Roberto Saviano: Writing Under Police Protection
(Roberto Saviano: uno scrittore sotto scorta)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2016
- Director Pif
- Cast Pif, Roberto Saviano, Rosaria Capacchione, Raimondo Di Maio, Mirella Pignataro
- Genre Documentary, TV Movie
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Soldier's Lullaby
(Заспанка за војнике)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Serbia • 2018
- Director Predrag Antonijević
- Cast Ljubomir Bandović, Marko Vasiljević, Vuk Jovanović, Marko Pavlovski, Nenad Okanović, Marko Gvero
- Genre War
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Waiting for the Carnival
(Estou Me Guardando para Quando o Carnaval Chegar)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Brazil • 2019
- Director Marcelo Gomes
- Cast
- Genre Documentary
- Available on OVID
The Traitor
(Il traditore)
After trying to leave the mafia for Brazil, Tommaso Buscetta is forced to return to Italy and become an informant.
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy, France, Germany • 2019
- Director Marco Bellocchio
- Cast Pierfrancesco Favino, Maria Fernanda Cândido, Fabrizio Ferracane, Fausto Russo Alesi, Luigi Lo Cascio, Bruno Cariello
- Genre Crime, Drama, Thriller
- Available on Amazon Prime Video, Amazon Prime Video with Ads, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube, AMC on Demand
Iris: A Space Opera by Justice
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- France • 2019
- Director André Chemetoff, Armand Beraud
- Cast Xavier de Rosnay, Gaspard Augé
- Genre Music
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Ordinary Happiness
(Momenti di trascurabile felicità)
After dying in an accident, a man is granted the opportunity to come back to Earth for 92 minutes.
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2019
- Director Daniele Luchetti
- Cast Pif, Thony, Renato Carpentieri, Franz Cantalupo, Vincenzo Ferrera, Roberta Caronia
- Genre Comedy, Fantasy
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Fight Like Angels
(Aquile randagie)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy • 2019
- Director Gianni Aureli
- Cast Teo Guarini, Alessandro Intini, Romeo Tofani, Ralph Palka, Anna Malvaso, Marco Pratesi
- Genre Drama, History
- Available on Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, YouTube