Film

What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases

Search cinema listings

Browse cinemas A-Z

Search 20,000 reviews

 

La Meglio Gioventù (2003)

Director: Marco Tullio Giordana

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

This very fine six-hour drama charts the fortunes of an Italian family from the mid-'60s to the present. It's an honorable contribution to a tradition that includes Rocco and His Brothers, The Leopard, even The Godfather, but here the drama's political dimensions are delineated more clearly than usual. While Nicola, for instance, tries to overcome early disappointment by taking a hippy holiday, falling for a leftie who ends up in the Red Brigades, and working for the improvement of his country's psychiatric practices, his brother Matteo treats the very same sense of failure as an excuse to end up first in the army and then in the police. (Even the conspicuous absence of specific political references during the last hour speaks volumes about the Berlusconi era, given the accent on activism in earlier scenes.) Such oppositions might have made for schematic contrivance, but the sure sense of time and place in Sandro Petraglia and Stefano Rulli's complex but beautifully lucid script and the visceral depth and subtlety of the performances result in classical storytelling of the highest order.

Author: GA 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Top Stories

Review: Penélope Cruz more raunchy than ever in 'Nine'

Review: Penélope Cruz more raunchy than ever in 'Nine'

Dave Calhoun reports on Rob Marshall's Oscar-touted musical with Daniel Day-Lewis playing a troubled director

Time Out's 101 Films of the Decade

Time Out's 101 Films of the Decade

Ten years, thousands of movies and millions of dollars in international box office, and it all boils down to this

Jim Jarmusch on 'The Limits of Control'

Jim Jarmusch on 'The Limits of Control'

Jim Jarmusch has followed ‘Broken Flowers’ with an esoteric crime mystery. Dave Calhoun speaks to him from his New York office

Richard Linklater on 'Me and Orson Welles'

Richard Linklater on 'Me and Orson Welles'

Dave Calhoun meets the 49-year-old, Houston-born filmmaker Richard Linklater to discuss his new comedy

Our verdict on Peter Jackson's The Lovely Bones

Our verdict on Peter Jackson's The Lovely Bones

Peter Jackson ends a triumphant decade with a sentimental misfire with this lush Alice Sebold adaptation

On the set of Ken Loach's 'Route Irish'

On the set of Ken Loach's 'Route Irish'

Dave Calhoun meets Ken Loach on the set of his forthcoming Iraq war movie

Is 'Paranormal Activity' the new 'Blair Witch'?

Is 'Paranormal Activity' the new 'Blair Witch'?

How does a film go from DIY experiment to box-office smash? 'Paranormal Activity' director Oren Peli explains

A gateway to all things 'New Moon'

A gateway to all things 'New Moon'

In anticipation of 'The Twilight Saga: New Moon', Time Out is offering the chance to pick up a limited edition pack with three exclusive magazines and a free poster.

The films that deserve a TV spin-off

The films that deserve a TV spin-off

With Roland Emmerich suggesting he'd like to make a '2012' TV spin-off, we propose some more movie-to-TV serialisations

Time Out's 50 greatest animated films with commentary by Terry Gilliam

Time Out's 50 greatest animated films with commentary by Terry Gilliam

In celebration of the release of Pixar's 'Up' and Wes Anderson's 'Fantastic Mr Fox', read our rundown of fifty classic feature length animations