This is a strangely self-defeating film, jumping at themes that remain beyond its imaginative reach, and when they prove elusive, masking the resultant stumble with a joke.

Sicilian Letters may be based on a fascinating real-life tale, but there’s unfortunately not that much interesting going on in this fictionalised version of those events.

Considering reality was the departure point, the filmmakers somehow fall short with their possibilities, choosing a perplexing, rather underwhelming destination, which crash-lands into a finale.

More of a romp than a revengers’ tragedy. In part, this can be shored home to the central presence of the great Tony Servillo, whose resting expression of ironic amusement gives everything around him a touch of levity.