Comrade Alfredo Neri is a “performative documentary” on media representation and identity construction through the media. The video is a constructed documentation, with real interviews and footage material, about the life of Alfredo Neri, the spokesman of the Italian fraction of the Skinhead Movement. The skinheads are affiliated with the neo-Nazis and are active in the European countries as well as in the former East Block. Neri is the representative and promoter of the Italian division of the skinheads, their international affiliations and events; in other words, the representative of the state of fear that envelops civil societies.
In the documentary, he explains how the movement changed its strategy to suit contemporary global political tendencies, urging its members to operate as invisible as possible and infiltrate the political, economic, and cultural structures, with the ultimate aim to rule in Europe. They operate without being exposed and are directly affiliated with the neo-Nazi ideology. Is history about to repeat itself, changing only the outfit?
The authors met Alfredo Neri during his visit to Scandinavia, on his travel to Helsingborg, Sweden, for the annual gathering of the neo-Nazi movement in Autumn 2005.
The film is presented after a short lecture-introduction, followed by a discussion with the audience, in which the spokesperson, takes part unexpectedly. The whole project “Comrade Alfredo Neri” questions media representation and construction of identity through a fake documentary-portrait based on real facts, presented as Part 1 of the project. The audience expects Part 2 to come after the debate; instead, the audience itself becomes Part 2, the debate, discussion and sparking of stimuli injected by the film (Part 1).
