The
Best of Youth
2003
Director: Marco Tullio Giordana
Starring: Luigi Lo Cascio, Alessio Boni
Phew. That’s what I have to say after cannonballing
all of this movie in one day. Why do I
say “phew?” Two reasons. First of all, the dang thing clocks in at
just over six hours. That’s right, I
just sat and watched a six hour movie with minimal breaks. Why would you subject yourself to that, you
may ask. Good question. The answer is reason number two: this movie has
the capacity to pull you in, emotionally, so emerging from it, I feel as though
I am surfacing once more to the real world.
I have been completely engulfed in the world of The Best of Youth for the
past day. Hence “phew.”
The
story focuses on the two brothers in the Carati family, Nicola (Lo Cascio) and
Matteo (Boni). Nicola isn’t the best
student, but he works hard and is good-natured and dreams of becoming a
doctor. Matteo is a supremely gifted
student, but also highly strung with some anger issues. Right off the bat, we witness Matteo drop out
of school and enlist in the army, and later the police force, while Nicola
takes off for a backpack trip through Norway on his way to becoming a
psychiatrist, an inspiration after he meets a young mental patient
Giorgia. The movie starts in the 1960s
and follows the brothers’ lives, the lives of their parents, their two sisters,
various love interests, and, ultimately, children, through to 2003, all against
the backdrop of recent Italian history.
