Italian American Gangsters Taking on a New Line of Work in Luc Besson’s The Family (2013)

Looking for ‘a new line of work’ is a recurrent theme in Luc Besson’s 2013 film The Family in which an Italian American mobster has no regrets for his past life, and only agrees to live under the witness protection to ensure his family’s survival. Set in present-day Normandy, the film takes the gangster genre to a new terrain while also serving as a vehicle for its director’s obsession with Hollywood gangster films. This chapter examines the ‘new line of work’ for a genre in danger of becoming extinct and the mediatic disguise envisioned by French filmmaker Luc Besson to enable the survival of gangster movies in the twenty-first century.