The Best of Youth – My favorite film that’s not Inception


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If you know me, you’ll know I haven’t been able to shut up about La meglio giovent๠(The Best of Youth) since I Netflixed it a few weeks ago. I’ve since purchased the film and gave the six-hour long epic another go. I’m happy to say that the second viewing is better than the first. And although the film came out in 2003, I can still feel cool and hip about watching it so late because it’s foreign. You can keep your flannel on.

The story primarily follows two brothers, Nicola and Matteo Carati, from their university years in the 60s to 2003. As grand in scope as it is in length, the film takes its characters all around Italy through pivotal moments in their history, from the 1966 Arno River flood in Florence to the 1992 assassination of Judge Falcone in Palermo, and as far up as a trip to Norway (there is a scene here where Nicola meets an “American” expatriate who still sounds like he has a non-American accent).

Perhaps the most notable characteristic of this film is its ability to draw the viewer into the Caratis’ profound lives. It depicts an entire lifetime in a circular sense, where moments that seem to be an ending really are new beginnings. There are several moments in this film that shake you such that you remember the scenes well after viewing them, as if it found your soul and smacked that little bitch around some.

12 thoughts on “The Best of Youth – My favorite film that’s not Inception

  1. Suki wants to watch it too. I’m warning you though, it’s six-hours long (two acts). Though Ebert said:

    “Every review of “The Best of Youth” begins with the information that it is six hours long. No good movie is too long, just as no bad movie is short enough. I dropped outside of time and was carried along by the narrative flow; when the film was over, I had no particular desire to leave the theater, and would happily have stayed another three hours. The two-hour limit on most films makes them essentially short stories. “The Best of Youth” is a novel.”
    http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050331/REVIEWS/50310004/1023

  2. The second act is the most profound, I think, especially since you’re already driven deep into the story. Would be a shame to prolong its viewing.

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