#Caracatita film series
#Caracatita film tv

It was partly due to these political pressures that the 8th and 9th seasons deviated from telling a story set in contemporary times and shifted to the earlier era of the landowner-and-peasant mafia of the 1950s and 1960s, mainly focusing on the private affairs of the protagonists rather than on the business of Cosa Nostra, and the plot was almost entirely detached from the other chapters of the saga.įinally, with 'La piovra 10', the show strived to tie up any loose ends which were previously left pending and to present an updated perspective of the Mafia of the early 2000s.

Despite this, the show continued to have great success with the public and with critics, even at the international level. This fact generated several political controversies as well as strong pressure to put an end to the series. The intricate stories of politics, finance, Freemasonry, corruption, and organized crime which are told in seasons 5 to 7 (1990-1995) were inspired by the political and news stories of those years, and attempted to present the notion that the Mafia was not based on concepts of honour and valour but was rather a harmful societal phenomenon replete with fraud, cold-blooded killers, and a cause of social decay. The plot intensifies in the fourth season, at the end of which the main protagonist, Commissioner Corrado Cattani (played by Michele Placido), is killed due to the increasing knowledge he acquires about the Mafia's vast dealings and criminal operations. The third season tells the story of the Mafia's financial dealings through international banks and the illegal trafficking of weapons and nuclear waste. The first season moves from localized drug trafficking rings in Sicily to the palaces of power in Rome in the second. Particularly important to the show is the narrative evolution with which the multiple tentacles of organized crime spread through local and international networks, and this is also the basis of the show's title. The show presents an extremely realistic portrayal of the violence and heartlessness of members of organized crime, and this remains the most distinctive feature of the production to this day.

#Caracatita film series

La Piovra is still considered to be the most famous Italian television series in the world, and all seasons received widespread public approval, with an average of 10 million and a peak of 15 million viewers. In Portugal, it was re-cast by RTP Memória.

#Caracatita film tv

The TV drama was successful in the USSR, where it appeared on state TV in 1986 and in Albania, Romania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Bulgaria, where it appeared in the end of the 1980s (in its seventh season, the show featured Bulgarian actor Stefan Danailov). The first three seasons were shown in the UK on Channel 4. It was also broadcast on MHz Networks in the United States. All ten seasons were released in Australia on DVD with English subtitles by Aztec International Entertainment, having originally aired on the Special Broadcasting Service television channel. The show was successfully exported to over 80 countries during and after its close to 20-year run. The music was written by Riz Ortolani (first season), Ennio Morricone (from the second to the seventh season and again on the tenth season), and by Paolo Buonvino (from the eighth to the ninth season). The series was directed by various directors who each worked on different seasons, including Damiano Damiani (first season), Florestano Vancini (second season), Luigi Perelli (from the third to the seventh season and again on the tenth season), and Giacomo Battiato (from the eighth to the ninth seasons). La Piovra ( Italian pronunciation: English: The Octopus, referring to the Mafia) is an Italian television drama series about the Mafia.