Best of Utes, Part 2

One good reason to have a film that lasts six hours is to tell a story that takes a long time. Best of Youth spans forty years. This wasn't unexpected since the first three hours, which I saw yesterday, spans twenty years.

Admittedly, the story treats Italy as if there's only about twenty people, since they keep bumping into each other, time and again. At times, the story is nearly allegorical. The film starts off with Matteo, who's an idealist, who thinks being a successful doctor will solve problems. When he sees that shock treatment exists, he tries to take matters in his own hands, and frees Giorgia, who has been treated using shock treatment. Does she represent the state of Italy, where people hid their problems.

Matteo decides to join the army, then become a cop, figuring this might solve problems, and yet, realizes he may have to kill his brother's wife, who's abandoned him to join Italian terrorists. For Americans who think terrorism is a novel concept, only recently occuring in 2001, Europeans have had to deal with terrorism, often of the home grown variety, for twenty years. And those acts weren't isolated to a single day, but occurred over many years, with assasinations aplenty.

Adriana, the eldest sister, is a judge. Francesca marries Carlo, a friend of Matteo and Nicola, the two brothers, who is a high ranking official in Italy, Their mother is a teacher. The father looking to find some way to get rich quick, but always optimistic about the future. The various figures represent different ways of good people trying to make Italy a better place to live.

In the early parts of the film, Nicola is taking an oral exam. The old professor tells him that he should leave the country, head to England or Norway or the United States. Italy, he said, is rotting, and is going to collapse, and won't become any better until the dinosaurs are removed, him being one of those dinosaurs. Carlo is told that he should leave Italy, lest he become a victim of terrorism. He stays because he believes good people need to stay, and help Italy.

Giorgia, in some ways, represents Italy itself, starting off in an asylum, but finally able to live on her own, through the goodness of Matteo, who ends up, despite his idealism, thinking he has failed. And yet, the film also treats these characters as people too.

Perhaps the film ends to happily or too optimistically. Sara, the daughter of Nicola and Giulia, has grown up resentful. Giulia realizes she's not a very good mother, and leaves late in the first film to do what she's passionate about, which is to make Italy better, admittedly, through terrorism. She looks very much like Jennifer Garner. And yet, once Sara is ready to find Giulia, shortly after she's announced her engagment to her boyfriend, she's ready to forgive.

Mirella, who Matteo has an affair with, has gone to Rome to be a librarian at a beautiful library. When Matteo commits suicide, Mirella decides that she will do what he advised, which is to photograph people, and she does this as a photojounalist. Yet Matteo has treated her like crap, lying to her, then being unable to be tender. He sees prostitutes, and doesn't even know he's fathered a child. Yet, she's happy to see Nicola (who Matteo pretended to be) and invites their mother to live with her in Sicily.

As with the first part, the second part is funny, but not in the conventional funny, but in its observations. It's amusing to see Italians doing their best Marlon Brando. After all, this is the birthplace of the mafia. Throughout the years, you see the steadiness of friends. Carlo and Vitale (I think that's his name) are there, with Carlo being the successful bureaucrat, and Vitale having been reduced to manual labor before Carlo has him build his dream house, and helps him to his feet.

The film ends with Matteo's child journeying through Norway much as his uncle (now father, since he marries his mother) did in the 60s. He manages to go where his father and uncle did not make, and this too, I think represents a hopeful look to Italy's future.

I will say that Mirella marrying Nicola seemed a bit forced. A friend commented that it seemed odd that Nicola would spend more than thirty years by himself, never marrying, though it's hinted that he's had plenty of women, but never anyone that's lasted.

Still, in the end, it's a very pleasant experience. I picked up a little Italian (very little), and saw a little of Italy's history, and got to know this family that represented all that Italians wanted to be, to do for their country.