There an old expression, “Age is just a number” and for some that’s true, but for the protagonists in Youth it couldn’t be farther. Fred Ballinger (Michael Caine) and Mick Doyle (Harvey Keitel) are a pair of old friends who both have failed to accept old age gracefully. Both long for their glory days, but both for different reasons, Fred longs to make up for mistakes in his past while Mick wants to feel like he did fifty years earlier. Both Caine and Keitel pour their souls into their performances, and both men act as though it isn’t really acting at all. The central idea of this film is that at the end of our lives all we have left are the emotions we felt. The memories are gone and so are the people, all we get are the feelings and neither man wants to accept that there isn’t some grander explanation to the misery of aging. Great film and great performances, with supporting turns from Rachel Weisz, Paul Dano, and a return to form for Jane Fonda.
There is such a thing as Youth wasted, but not in this case.
Due in part to great performances, I’m going to give this one…
3.5 out of 5
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