Weekend Netflix Report: Youth Without Youth

Youth Without Youth (2007)

We like to think there is a sharp distinction between what happens in the "real world" and what happens inside our heads. Some of the most interesting (to me) films of the last few years have called this bedrock assumption into question. Youth Without Youth is one of them. Francis Ford Coppola explores Lynchian territory with this one, creating the same sort of unsolvable conundrums -- if we're to take what we see on the screen literally -- that Inland Empire does.

[SPOILERS AHEAD] An aged (70ish) Romanian linguistics professor (Tim Roth) is struck by lightning in 1938, and when he recovers, he's physically 30 years younger. As Europe falls, the Nazis take an ominous interest in him, and he's forced to change his identity and go into hiding. Over the next 30 years, he appears not to age a day. He pursues his linguistics studies but never manages to complete the book he's working on. He meets doppelgangers of himself and a woman he once loved, who died in 19th century. In the end, he returns to Romania, and suddenly it's 1938 again and he resumes his normal age. In the final scene, we see his wizened corpse lying in the street -- as a miniskirted woman (circa 1969) walks by.

No, it's not "all a dream" of a dying man, since many future historical events (Hiroshima, the moon landing) are referenced, accurately, along the way. Just as with Inland Empire, there's no way to make logical sense of the story. I tend to think that this sort of plot works better on the printed page (in a Philip K. Dick novel, for example) than in the photographic realism of the movie screen -- and this film is, in fact, based on a novella by Mircea Eliade. But I'm a sucker for movies that make me think. I'm not sorry I watched this, though I wouldn't recommend it as mere entertainment. Roth is fine. The direction and cinematography are up to Coppola standards, though a few of his choices seem overly mannered -- several shots are presented upside down (perhaps a clue that what we're seeing is a "reflection" of reality?)