Ragazzaccio 2022

Mattia Silvetti is an 18-year-old who pushes against rules and often tests the boundaries of school life, risking a flunk out as his attitude in class leads to repeated removals. The weight of failing weighs on him, even more than the looming pandemic that disrupts life in Italy.

In March 2020, the country locks down. Piero Silvetti is a nurse racing through exhausting shifts at the hospital, while Cinzia Silvetti sits at home, impatient and worn down by the sudden confinement. Mattia is stuck in the silence of his room, navigating a world of video calls and distance-learning lessons, where he still spouts bully-pranks at teachers and classmates.

Amid this upheaval, he starts to discover love. He meets Lucia, the school representative from the nearby high school, through social networks, and the feelings begin to reshape how he sees himself and others. He also encounters a steady influence in Professor Roncucci, who offers private tutoring and a hopeful message: If you study, you become better, you live better, you fall in love better.

As the pandemic tightens its grip, Mattia learns a disturbing truth about his family: his mother is having an extramarital affair, an event that forces him to reassess his parents’ flaws and his own reactions to them. His father, a hospital nurse like at least one other hero in this story, falls ill with Covid during night shifts, and his mother is left caught between worry and the claustrophobia of forced cohabitation.

A cruel misstep follows when Mattia commits cyberbullying against Zoli, a disabled classmate. This act brings him to a dangerous low, a moment that tests every boundary he has built around himself. Yet the very love he begins to feel—from Lucia and the courage sparked by Professor Roncucci—gives him a new drive to grow and change.

The national response to the health emergency complicates his path forward: the government suspends the traditional school calendar but decides to promote all students to continue learning from home for a time. This twist creates a strange, pressured environment in which growth is measured not by grades alone but by character and self-awareness.

By the end of the school year, Mattia — bolstered by love and responsibility — writes to President Sergio Mattarella, requesting to be flunked so he can relive a year that proved to be pivotal for his maturation, this time with wiser eyes and a deeper sense of purpose. The letter marks a turning point, signaling that he has chosen a path toward accountability, empathy, and a more thoughtful future.

This story unfolds as a witness to resilience and the messy, powerful process of growing up under extraordinary circumstances. It is about how love, support, and honest self-reflection can steer a young person away from harm and toward a more compassionate, grounded life.