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Youth Without Youth

Reaching for the stars

By PETER KEOUGH | December 19, 2007

2.5 Stars

VIDEO: Watch the trailer for Youth Without Youth.

When a film starts out with a Romanian professor (Tim Roth) who’s been granted eternal youth, superhuman intelligence, and a doppelgänger by a lightning strike and is writing a book summarizing all knowledge while avoiding capture by the Nazis, perhaps it should avoid adding a woman (Alexandra Maria Lara) who’s the reincarnation of a seventh-century Buddhist shaman as a love interest. But try telling Francis Coppola that, especially since he hasn’t uncorked a lulu like this one since From the Heart. Adapting the novella by Mircea Eliade, the American auteur must have identified with the film’s elderly hero, Dominic, who has seen his ambitions come to naught and decides to do himself in before the providential bolt from the blue intervenes. It’s only 1938, and by the time we get to Apollo 11, Coppola has exhausted his narrative invention and some viewers’ patience. But I admire a guy who keeps reaching for the stars, even when he lands on his ass. 125 minutes | Boston Common + Fenway + Kendall Square + Circle/Chestnut Hill + suburbs

Topics: Reviews , Entertainment, Movies, Francis Ford Coppola, More

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