My name is Francesco Totti

When I was offered to tell the story of an immense and transversal figure like Francesco Totti, I was in doubt whether to accept or not. Not out of arrogance but, on the contrary, out of humility. I have never been a die-hard fan, although a Romanista at heart since birth, and I thought that this should not be a documentary about football, but rather a filmic memento of an unrepeatable period for Rome, and of its protagonist, who had no equal, and will have no equal, in the history of this city.

Once I got on board and met Francesco, from whom I wanted an official blessing on my 'vision', I then asked myself what unprecedented magic I could bring to the story of this man and this champion, whom everyone knows. I immediately felt that the right path was the opposite of S is for Stanley, my previous documentary that narrated the exploits of a nobody, Emilio D'Alessandro, a small man who during the film grows to become as great as (if not greater than) his antagonist/co-protagonist, Stanley Kubrick.

I had to do the opposite, shrink Totti, make him the same size as the viewer, without however reducing his sporting achievements. To do this, without sinning from omnipotence, I had only one possibility: that of first-person narration, that is: to involve Francesco completely, who became the sole narrating voice of the story, the only one who could downsize himself.

It is well known that sportsmen are not very keen on talking, and Totti in this is even legendary; his monosyllabic comments have made history. Yet, every time I chatted with him privately, another human being emerged, a man capable of introspective impulses and imaginative and surprising descriptions.

To recreate this unexpected intimacy, I chose to organize the voice recording sessions in an almost psychoanalytic environment: a room illuminated only by a bedside lamp, a sofa, a practically invisible microphone above our heads, in addition to a computer screen, on which Francesco would see images of his life appear, very often unprecedented even for him. The sessions, but they could easily be called sittings, lasted hours and hours, with a few coffee or snack breaks, strictly consumed within that amniotic environment.

After the first time – in which we studied each other and took each other's measure – Francesco always arrived at these appointments with a great desire to talk and open up, perhaps discovering an unprecedented side of himself. Gradually, as we delved into his story, I realized that the Captain, Tottigò, Er Bimbo De Oro, were increasingly becoming Francesco, that boy born in Rome at the end of the last century, who knows how to play football but who, even more, has always believed in the strength of community, family, tribe.

Everything told in the film – like everything omitted – is a reflection of what Francesco truly finds important in his story, the story that brought him here. And it is precisely he, with his surging narration, who guided the film. It was wonderful to see him gallop into his own unconscious, and then 'build' the dramaturgy at a later stage, during editing, structuring it and making it cinematic thanks to the music and never-before-seen images that I had available.

I chose the title "Mi Chiamo Francesco Totti" (My Name is Francesco Totti), because it recalls the opening of a school essay, a return to the playground, to street games, that moment when anything is possible, when the ending is open. And it is also for this reason that the film ends in Francesco's schoolyard, as if to say: time has passed, it's true, but life is still all ahead. Even if sometimes we would all like to rewind the tape a little, and go back.