Published: 10/09/2019 By The Abode Team
No Time To Die, the latest Bond film, and Daniel Craig's last, is currently being filmed in the amazing Southern Italian town of Matera.Matera is said to be the world’s third-oldest town, dating back to the Palaeolithic Age and inhabited continuously for around 7000 years. The simple natural grottoes that dotted the gorge were adapted to become homes, and an ingenious system of canals regulated the flow of water and sewage. In the 8th century the caves became home to Benedictine and Basilian monks; the earliest cave paintings date from this period.
A then-prosperous Matera became the capital of Basilicata in 1663, a position it held until 1806 when the power moved to Potenza. In the decades that followed, an unsustainable increase in population led to the habitation of unsuitable grottoes – originally intended as animal stalls – even lacking running water. The dreadful conditions fostered a tough and independent spirit: in 1943, Matera became the first Italian city to rise up against German occupation.
By the 1950s more than half of Matera’s population lived in the sassi, typical caves sheltering families with an average of six children. The infant mortality rate was 50%. In his poetic and moving memoir, Christ Stopped at Eboli, Carlo Levi describes how children would beg passers-by for quinine to stave off the deadly malaria. Such publicity finally galvanised the authorities into action and in the late 1950s about 15,000 inhabitants were forcibly relocated to new government housing schemes.
This fascinating location will no doubt provide a stunning back-drop for the film, directed by Cary Fukanga and due to be realeased in April 2020, though a car chase there would be quite an achievement!