The Making of the Lure

Carlo Collodi (1826–1890) was an avid gambler who regularly found himself in serious financial trouble. To pay off a debt, he wrote the Pinocchio fairy tale about a wooden puppet whose nose grows whenever he lies. Pinocchio is also the name of the protagonist in The Making of the Lure, a satirical film about debt. To get the production off the ground, two filmmakers take out loans on highly unfavorable terms—in their search for sponsors they have no qualms about concealing or distorting the truth.

In cinema verité style, the movie tracks the messy production process, but it is unclear whether we are watching a sincere attempt to make a documentary going hopelessly wrong, or a scam that blows up in its perpetrators’ faces. We do, however, learn a great deal about lenders, debt, and how easy it is to sink ever deeper into a bottomless pit.