“There are three kinds of men: the living, the dead and the sailors”. This phrase from Aristophanes opens and summarizes the intent of this documentary to tell the story of a category of sea workers we never see, some 2 million people.

They are the seafarers of merchant ships that move 11 BILLION tons per year on the water, with an average of 120 thousand ships. 80% of the items we own come from the sea. They receive very low salaries compared to the constant responsibilities and dangers. Filipinos, Chinese, Ukrainians, Indians, are the ethnic groups that most make up the backbone of this commercial structure. Often with starvation wages.

When one arrives at a commercial port, one has the impression of crossing a border, a frontier beyond which there are other landscapes, other laws, and above all, other men whose presence one perceives only through these large machines, these cranes that resemble giant insects, which at any moment seem to grab even the car on which you travel. It is like entering another state, and by state we mean both the physical and the metaphysical. And one wonders how all this iron stays afloat.

INVISIBLES was filmed all in Italy by being on land, in ports, specifically those in Ravenna and Monfalcone. Going on board some of the ships, listening to the voices and stories of different sailors.

In the documentary, the sounds of the port can be heard, forming a veritable symphony of sounds that accompany the viewer from place to place. As with the port of Ravenna, where it takes about 20 minutes by car to cross the twelve kilometers of quay on the right side and another twelve on the left side. Ravenna handles about 25 million tons a year and 100,000 seafarers.

Cranes work tirelessly night and day to empty these huge ships from all over the world, whose holds resemble Olympic-sized swimming pools. Private companies take care of unloading, processing, packaging and shipping the materials that arrive. Ships with soybeans come in and trucks with bottles of oil go out.

The camera goes down into the heart of the ship, to the engine room. It is like entering the belly of a cave. There are engines in continuous activity joined by pipes, valves, thermostats. It looks a lot like a set from a science fiction movie. The deafening noise disorients.

For Ukrainian sailors, being at sea for two years is better than being at war. Tired of the hard work on board, they dream of a return home that smacks of fear. Ivan, a young second officer, knows that if he returned home he would definitely be drafted: “I don’t want this war, life is very important to me. I’m not a soldier, I’m just a sailor”.

If for Ukrainian sailors the ship is an escape route from war, for others it has become a prison. That’s what happened to a crew of a poorly maintained Tanzanian-flagged ship. Stranded for months in Italy, in the port of Monfalcone. The shipowner abandoned ship and crew, leaving them far from home and isolated from everyone. Without pay, without food and without safe conditions on board. Their story is one of many cases of abandoned ships, ghost ships, of suspended lives waiting to sail again.

INVISIBLES a documentary by Raffaele Manco and Raffaele Marco della Monica made for the series The Human Factor, first aired in February 2024 on Rai 3 and in audio podcast version on Rai Radio 1.