Product Description

In the award-winning epic tradition of THE GODFATHER and COLD MOUNTAIN THE BEST OF YOUTH has wowed critics and earned honors at numerous film festivals worldwide. As Italy explodes in an era of social unrest a single ill-fated incident sends the lives of equally idealistic brothers Nicola and Matteo Carati careening in opposite directions. Divided by politics but bonded by blood the next 40 years will find the brothers divergent paths intersecting through some of the most tumultuous events in recent history! A stunning cinematic achievement you don t want to miss this incredible motion picture!System Requirements:Running Time 400 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 786936291193 Manufacturer No: 04083600

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2620 in DVD
• Brand: Buena Vista Home Video
• Released on: 2006-02-07
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: Italian
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 2
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 368 minutes

Amazon.com
368 minutes of Italian TV miniseries--yes, that is indeed six hours' worth--comes unspooling in The Best of Youth, a stirring and beautiful experience. The film needs its running time to immerse us in the world of the Carati family from 1966 to near the present day. Two brothers are the primary focus: Nicola (Luigi Lo Cascio), a responsible medical student, and Matteo (Alessio Boni), a troubled soldier. After a youthful road trip, their paths diverge, but each is carried along by the changing, sometimes violent, political weather of Italy in the 1970s and '80s. Life issues surge and ebb, with the increasing sense that Matteo is a lost soul, beyond even the help of the luminous woman (unforgettable Maya Sansa) who comes into his life.

Truth be told, The Best of Youth has some of the limitations of made-for-TV fare, from the simplicity of its themes to its cheap-looking makeup. (Those beards are not convincing.) But by the time you've spent a couple of hours with these characters, you're deeply invested in their joys and sorrows. At that point the measured pace begins to feel like the rhythm of life, and the people onscreen a mirror of ourselves. It's probably true that the cultural references and specific historic events will have more resonance for Italians than other viewers, but everything translates. Director Marco Tullo Giordana maintains the tone by allowing details to accumulate, and the location shooting, including a stint at the cinematically rich island of Stromboli, is consistently rich (his sampling of the music from Jules and Jim feels like a shortcut somehow, but who could argue that the music isn't perfectly in key with the melancholy mood?). The final act delivers an emotional coup de grace that has been thoroughly earned. And you'll feel like you earned it, too, having spent six hours with this moving film. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews

The Best of Youth
I loved this miniseries. The subtitles were succinct so that I didn't miss any of the action by reading the subtitles. The six and a half hours went by quickly, so quickly that I watched the movie twice, straight through.

Excellent story line, great scenes, terrific characters -- and the real reason I bought movie -- the beautiful villa in the last 30 minutes is the very same villa in Tuscany where my husband and I have stayed twice!

The best italian movie in many years
This is a real amazing work of art. It's a very touching melodrama, historically interesting and dramatically powerful. It tells the story of two brothers in parallel with the History of Italy in the last 40 years of the 20th. Century. A warning: probably you might feel that it's slow moving in the first two hours. However, you should wait for what is coming. The last hour is so moving that you'll need more than a handkerchief. The acting of the whole cast is superb, as well as the photography and the music, including popular songs from each decade. Simply marvellous! If you've lived and remember the decades of the sixties and nineties, this movie is for you. An authentic masterpiece that you will want to admire more than once. If ten stars existed, I would give them all.

Truly spectacular, moving, humane
"The Best of Youth" is a six-hour mini-series that follows the fortunes of an Italian family from the 1960s almost to the present. It is an amazing experience for the viewer. It's like a cinematographic version of "War and Peace" with a lovely, slow, thoughtful and ultimately moving love story at its heart.
The movie is based around the experiences of two brothers who go through a seminal experience together when they are young students and react in very different ways. One joins the army and then the police; the other becomes a child psychiatrist. We also meet their friends, an economist and a builder.
As the lens widens, we are drawn into a loving family circle. Every character is so precisely etched we feel we know them -- the speculator father, teacher mother, two sisters...I have to add here that the acting is uniformly superb. The music that accompanies the action is also brilliant and of course the photography and depiction of Italy are stunning.
I'm not Italian so some of the events they live through don't have the same resonance for me -- the threat of the Red Brigades who engaged in urban terrorism for example.
Here is a group of people who live through tragedy and yet survive. I was tremendously struck by the general attitude of the movie -- compassionate, understanding and yet it takes a clear moral stance. These aren't heroes -- just ordinary people doing their best. Not all of them succeed -- there are some tragic failures here -- but most perservere, working through the bad times to celebrate the good.
This is a wonderful, wonderful movie. You'll laugh, you'll cry. See it!