The Best of Youth

This epic elegy to family and country is a towering work of narrative fiction.

Unfolds like a novel full of characters we can't help but care about.

Few films have ever made better use of combining social and political history with romantic melodrama and suspense.

Its point is this: That every nation, like a family, is made up of many people who are often at odds with one another, but that ultimately, we are all one.

A family that seems as real as your own relatives.

Despite many charming elements, this movie is not an example of good storytelling.

Revealing too much of the narrative would spoil the pleasure of learning where Matteo and Nicola find themselves. "Youth" sells us on the idea that life is a gift and that beauty and rejuvenation can come from even seemingly unbearable lows.

You weep, laugh, celebrate and mourn with the characters throughout the six hours, which at once seem like an eternity and an instant.

An astonishing, deeply engrossing Italian family saga that happens to be six hours long.