Alan Ball
Six Feet Under

Have you ever thought about how some topics are difficult for people to discuss and divulge, how embarrassing certain situations can be, perhaps everyday ones but uncomfortable nonetheless?

And how certain topics cannot fit into the category of "bar chat," or simply a normal conversation topic?

Whether applied to real or virtual life, whether addressed through any means (from verbal communication to general artistic means, literary, musical, cinematic, theatrical), there is absolutely one that is the most uncomfortable of all, the mere thought of which can sometimes create anxiety and discomfort, dismay and pain.

Exactly my dear, I am referring specifically to Death, the one that paradoxically represents the only certainty that man truly knows he has until the very end. A friend of mine used to say that we are forgetful of the beginning and unaware of the end, and he was absolutely right. Now, many of you might be touching wood or will have already turned the page, unable to reflect on how daring it was, I would say almost "politically incorrect" to think, plan, and build an entire television series, divided into 5 seasons of about 12 episodes each, with Death as its ultimate and absolute leitmotif and its heavy consequences on the lives of those who remain, as in those who obviously leave.

And it is around this taboo, as heavy as it is natural, that this series takes off in 2001 thanks to HBO (a famous American cable network) whose title refers to the usual burial depth of a coffin in America.

Obviously, the series (aired from 2001 to 2005) arrived in Italy with a considerable delay, 3 years later, and in the late night, if not later, due to the difficulty of the topic: who wants, after a hard day's work, to sit on the couch to watch a noir series that always begins with a death and whose plot seems to revolve entirely around the pain of loss and the organization of the deceased's funeral? And moreover, think the entire series could even be successful?

Yet author Alan Ball won his challenge overwhelmingly. This was thanks to the totally unusual formula of presenting traumatic events related to loss as the fulcrum and pivot, apparently the main theme of the show, but instead a pretext to talk about life in all its shades and differences, allowing all essential themes of existence to revolve around it (the loss) thus coming to the forefront, in sharp contrast.

To do this, Ball does not overlook any aspect of human existence, and every virtue, every flaw, every desire, every pettiness, and every greatness tied to the themes of family, love, sexuality, interpersonal relationships, work, money, and the individual in the broadest sense are all treated with deep humanity and lots of (dark) humor, delicacy and ruthlessness. It's the story of a narrator who delivers a complex and varied picture to his audience with the same delicacy with which a grandfather might pass on his experience to his grandchildren. The result is a believable and real fiction series like few other things seen and read.

In brief, the plot tells of a family-run funeral home, whose owner dies in the first few minutes of the first episode, passing the work to the younger son, who is gay, and the older one, who had left the family years earlier to lead a different life. It deals with all the people close to them (the mother, the teenage sister, friends, collaborators, and various partners who will come and go during their lives) and their most natural and human feelings.

The stylistic choices and grotesque and surreal passages that unfold in the individual episodes, as well as the intertwining of feelings, the dark humor that permeates the entire series, the set of strong emotions manifesting making us laugh till we are in tears or cry without shame, quickly made it one of the most important cult series in America and the UK, achieving decent success even here.

I believe that the winning formula of "Six Feet Under" (impeccable also from the point of view of directing and photography) is the fact of having had the courage from the first to the last episode (the finale, not obvious at all, is breathtakingly beautiful) to show exactly human life for what it really is, with its weaknesses, its fragilities, with its ruthless and devastating rawness as well as with its absolute, emotional beauty. The credit is that everyone finds a piece of themselves, a piece of their own weak trace, or of those of their loved ones who passed away. As if that weren't enough, the soundtrack is amazing. And we like that.

I can say without fear that I do not love any other "tele-cinematic" product with the same strength and passion.

For me, there is no comparison.