Roberto Minervini

Roberto Minervini—man, this guy doesn’t mess around when it comes to peeling back the layers of real life. Born in 1970 in Fermo, Marche, Italy, he’s not your average director. He’s got this way of sticking his camera right in the thick of things, making you feel like you’re standing in the middle of the world’s messiness, no filter. Take “Stop the Pounding Heart” from 2013—he grabbed a bunch of non-actors and just let them live their lives on screen, and the results? Raw as hell. You’re watching people struggle, love, mess up, and just exist in the wild weirdness of rural America. There’s a kind of poetry in how awkward and unpolished it all feels. Then there’s “The Other Side” (2015). Forget about sugarcoating. He dives into the rough corners of the American South—drugs, guns, heavy stuff. The kind of things polite society pretends isn’t there. Minervini’s got this knack for making you care about people you’d probably cross the street to avoid. It’s uncomfortable, but you can’t look away. And don’t get me started on “What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire?” (2018). Black communities in New Orleans, fighting to survive, to be heard, to stay human in a world that seems hell-bent on grinding them down. He just hands the mic over, and the stories spill out—painful, beautiful, gutsy as hell. If you want glossy Hollywood, look elsewhere. Minervini’s films are the real, unpolished deal.