Youth Without Youth (2007)Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Starring: Tim Roth, Alexandra Maria Lara, Bruno Ganz, Andre Hennicke, Marcel Iures, Matt Damon (uncredited cameo)
For my thesis I'm currently working on a case study on Francis Ford Coppola. I've seen all of his films from the 1970s and 1980s, and most of his 1990s work but still have to catch up with some of his very early work and his most recent work. Youth Without Youth was Coppola's first film after a ten year break from directing and kind of slipped under the radar. If it got a cinematic release in Australia it would have been a very limited one.
Based on a short story by Romanian philosopher Mircea Eliade, Youth Without Youth tells the story of 70 year old, Romanian linguist, Dominic Matei (Roth) who is struggling with the realisation that he will probably die before completing his life's work. One day he is struck by lightening but miraculously survives. While recovering in hospital it becomes apparent that the lightening strike has reversed the ageing process. His hair thickens and regains its colour, he grows a new set of teeth and his skin returns to that of a 40 year old. Matei also discovers that the strike has left him with intellectual super-powers; he can read people's thoughts and by simply holding a book can obtain all the information inside it. When the Nazis hear word of him they go after him, intrigued by the possibility that he is some sort of super-human. He escapes to neutral Switzerland where he comes across a young woman, Veronica (Lara), who is the spitting image of his lost love Laura. After an accident of her own, Veronica has a series of episodes in which she seems to regress backwards in linguistic time, first speaking in Sanskrit, then ancient Egyptian, then Babylonian, getting closer and closer to the Ur-language from which all other descended. While Dominic is excited because Veronica's episodes could hold the key to him finishing his life's work, it becomes apparent that Veronica's aging process is accelerated by being with Dominic, so he must chose between the woman he loves and the work he has devoted his life to.
Coppola is a really interesting figure in the history of the American film industry. While he has nowhere near the profile today that some of his peers enjoy (Scorsese, Spielberg, Lucas), by the end of the 1970s he was regarded as the most powerful filmmaker in history on the back of an incredible run of successes in the 1970s and his ability to manipulate the power structures around him. In the 1970s Coppola made four films; The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, The Conversation and Apocalypse Now. All four films received Best Picture nominations, with two Godfather films winning (The Godfather Part II and The Conversation were actually nominated in the same year). He also received three best director nominations for the decade, winning one. By the end of the decade he was such a powerful figure that he was able to open up his own film studio, Zoetrope Studios.
Coppola's ultimate ambition was to become a powerful enough figure that he could secure financial autonomy which brought with it the complete creative freedom to make the films he wanted to make. The problem was that the films he wanted to make were not necessarily the films the public wanted to see. Therefore when Coppola's first film for Zoetrope Studios, One From the Heart, bombed at the box office he was left with a massive debt which ultimately led to the closure of the studio. Coppola then spent the rest of the 1980s trying pay off debtors, while also struggling to attract big projects because the major studios were reluctant to trust him. By the 1990s he had become somewhat of a gun for hire. His talent as a filmmaker has never been questioned, rather it has been his ability or desire to make marketable films which has put him on the outer.
Youth Without Youth was Coppola's long awaited return to directing after a ten year absence, but rather than coming back with a bang, it was like he snuck in the back door. The film only received a very limited release and was definitely intended for a niche market. It was quite a divisive film, receiving mixed reviews, some quite positive and some absolutely scathing reviews. For example on At the Movies with Margaret and David, Margaret Pomeranz gave it four stars while David Stratton gave it one and a half.
Coppola's films, at least the ones he chooses for himself, usually have quite a personal bent to them, and Youth Without Youth is no exception. Coppola was 69 at the time he made this film, so the story of a 70 year old who is dealing with the realisation that he will probably never realise his overly ambitious life goals obviously struck a chord with him.
Coppola is a really interesting figure in the history of the American film industry. While he has nowhere near the profile today that some of his peers enjoy (Scorsese, Spielberg, Lucas), by the end of the 1970s he was regarded as the most powerful filmmaker in history on the back of an incredible run of successes in the 1970s and his ability to manipulate the power structures around him. In the 1970s Coppola made four films; The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, The Conversation and Apocalypse Now. All four films received Best Picture nominations, with two Godfather films winning (The Godfather Part II and The Conversation were actually nominated in the same year). He also received three best director nominations for the decade, winning one. By the end of the decade he was such a powerful figure that he was able to open up his own film studio, Zoetrope Studios.
Coppola's ultimate ambition was to become a powerful enough figure that he could secure financial autonomy which brought with it the complete creative freedom to make the films he wanted to make. The problem was that the films he wanted to make were not necessarily the films the public wanted to see. Therefore when Coppola's first film for Zoetrope Studios, One From the Heart, bombed at the box office he was left with a massive debt which ultimately led to the closure of the studio. Coppola then spent the rest of the 1980s trying pay off debtors, while also struggling to attract big projects because the major studios were reluctant to trust him. By the 1990s he had become somewhat of a gun for hire. His talent as a filmmaker has never been questioned, rather it has been his ability or desire to make marketable films which has put him on the outer.
Youth Without Youth was Coppola's long awaited return to directing after a ten year absence, but rather than coming back with a bang, it was like he snuck in the back door. The film only received a very limited release and was definitely intended for a niche market. It was quite a divisive film, receiving mixed reviews, some quite positive and some absolutely scathing reviews. For example on At the Movies with Margaret and David, Margaret Pomeranz gave it four stars while David Stratton gave it one and a half.
Coppola's films, at least the ones he chooses for himself, usually have quite a personal bent to them, and Youth Without Youth is no exception. Coppola was 69 at the time he made this film, so the story of a 70 year old who is dealing with the realisation that he will probably never realise his overly ambitious life goals obviously struck a chord with him.
Youth Without Youth looks wonderful. Coppola obviously has not lost the technical knack for filmmaking. Some of the shot composition is simply beautiful. The locations are quite visually appealing too, even if it is a bit apparent that even the scenes that were meant to be shot in another country, for example India, are still being shot in Romania. Coppola has always been interested in technology and uses some CGI in the film, but it is all very subtle and adds to the visual dynamic of the film. The performances are also quite strong. Tim Roth in particular puts in one of his more impressive performances as Dominic Matei, though he leaves a bit to be desired as a leading man. I will also say that the scenes in which he argues with himself (split personality shot back and forth from different angles) were just a bit too reminiscent of Gollum in Lord of the Rings for me to take seriously. Ultimately it is the narrative which really lets this film down.
The first half of the film, which is more concerned with Matei's recovery from the lightening strike and the discovery of its amazing effects on him, and then the struggle to escape the clutches of the Nazis, who see him as a super-human and want to experiment on him, is actually quite compelling. However the film kind of falls in heap in the second half as it gets lost in murky, philosophical territory. Coppola is obviously intrigued by the metaphysical concepts that Eliade's short story explored, and as a result has sought to maintain the exploration of those ideas, considering his film a meditation on time and consciousness where other filmmakers may have opted to transform the story into a much more simple entertainment. The problem is that by retaining some of the more obscure elements and ideas in the story the narrative becomes messy. It is obvious that this is all very interesting to Coppola, and this leads to a much more sincere film than some of the films which Coppola made as a gun for hire, for example Jack (that's right, Jack with Robin Williams was directed by the same guy who made The Godfather!), but unfortunately it is not always very interesting to us and at times gets quite dull.
While Youth Without Youth does have some redeeming features and you can definitely see glimpses of the skill which made Francis Ford Coppola one of the most respected filmmakers in history, you can also see that Coppola is still very much out of touch with his audience and is clearly making this film for himself. Thus the whole thing just feels a little pretentious. Something in it for the Coppola fans, not much for anyone else.
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