Overrated and overhyped

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

I had seen this before but in the much altered English language version without the the awful denouement of this original cut. Some consider the difficult and explicitly violent end rather inappropriate and not in keeping with the rest of the film. But, Fernando Di Leo was a fine director who also wrote much of the films he made, including this one and most of his films had a strong political stance. His, Caliber 9 is a great crime thriller example and this is a very decent sexploitation one. The lovely Gloria Guida is a bit led astray by the character played by Lilli Carati, as the cheat, steal and generally behave obnoxiously in the name of freedom. I don't know how realistic the commune presented here was in Italy but it doesn't seem like any other I've seen depicted. Even Valerie Solanas' S.C.U.M manifesto gets quoted here in the name of feminism and it is about at this stage (when a film maker is introduced) that we begin to realise what a gigantic swipe the writer/director is taking at the counter culture and its opponents. Nobody comes out of this well and the brilliantly directed ending will haunt for some time.

...if it had a better storyline. Avere vent'anni (or "2b20") has a cult movie status. Until it was released in DVD few years ago with much claim and wawings by the cinema of genres lover. Originally released in 1978 2b20 was a complete failure and the producer forced the director Di Leo to change the final ending. But this resulted in nothing and the movie fell in forgotten unless for the lesbian scene between Gloria Guida and Lilli Carati, the most beautiful and sexy actresses of the Italian cinema in the 70's, both retired for good, the first as the wife of ultra famous Italian ecletic showman Johnny Dorelli, the second victim of terrible personal issues. I believe Di Leo wanted to show how the decadent society kills the young spirits like raping them. The sense of the final scene is that there is no space for the freewill and the spirit is killed by the dusty tradition. As usual Fernando Di Leo uses the women body to criticize the male stupidity, insecurity. But the dark mood of the end of the movie have nothing to share with the comedy of the whole movie. In this movie the main characters of the two girls make no sympathy to the audience but their brutal death will make u sad. Anyways they are no heroes for the director. It seems that all the society and all the people are not worth a cent, not even the two girls, they die as they were only a minority. It is very difficult to find a focal point in the movie. There is simply not storyline, the events have no importance in the whole movie. The director seems riding the line between an intellectual protest to the society (that the counterculture was a total failure) and a commercial sexy movie. Probably a major disappointment for the director himself this is a movie nice to see by the comedy side. Lot of nice jokes, good direction, scenes that makes sense on their own. Unfortunately there is no consequentiality hence the spectator has no sense of time. It looks like a telefilm, made of episodes, with the same characters, but with different subjects. The final dark ending, the rape, is demonstrating that the same Di Leo didn't even know if this was an intellectual research on the failure of counterculture and all kind of human cultures, or just a show of the beautiful bodies of the two actresses to the audience, who were the top at the moment. Again the big regret is the total lack of a storyline. This is not new in Di Leo's movie; especially in the poliziesco genre the storyline is usual simple and easy, like the sentiment of human beings and in fact he's more interested in characters psychology. But in Avere Vent'Anni he is not able to give credibility to the events, the time is not stressed in any way, and the action is episodic. Despite this Di Leo doesn't loose a pinch of his screenplay writer genius. The characters speak common language, not a Shakespearean litany, he puts words that sound real. The directing is perfect, also in this minor movie you can appreciate how good was the Italian director. The Actors: it seems that the director shaped the personality of the two main characters on the two girls. Guida and Carati pierce the screen, they have a beautiful photogenic face, but they are not good actress at all, and need to be dubbed. While the character of Carati is a though leading spirit, the one of Guida is humble, silent. I don't know if this is due to the real capability of the two actresses, I've seen many movies and they provide the same expressions of this films. The character try to live their life at the limit, to be real humans that take decision, but the two actresses are not able to give a better impression than being an inflating doll, and the idea of the free girls of the director is totally reversed by their poor acting! Some kind of importance has the character played by Ray Lovelock, who is an ex teacher disappointed by the culture and the society who turned a junkie. Vittorio Caprioli is "il Nazariota", the Sai Baba wannabe, the chief of the commune. He's old, fat, and a little dumb, and looks always concerned of the economic part of the commune, and never about the spiritual. He witnesses the end of counterculture, and the decadence of those principles that made dream the young guys in early 70's. Caprioli is a fetish actor of Di Leo, and he doesn't disappoint. Funny and great as ever. The real good surprise is made by the comedian Giorgio Bracardi, especially famous in his surreal radio performances. Well Bracardi is over the top here and plays the part of the police officer who will send back home the two girls. It's incredible. He is serious, but he can be funny, grotesque is the right word. His facial expressions are exaggerated and this is the funny thing in it. He's so real in the stereotype of the police officer, that he becomes funny.This is an average movie. Nice to see and easy to forget about it. Di Leo has done some pictures with no time, real masterpieces fortunately rediscovered by the wise men at the beginning of this century. But Avere vent'anni is definitely not one of them. The movie was low budget and not well orchestrated like the other ones. The Di Leo style is present, but I rate 2b20 as one of his minor films.

Applying a simplistic, hypocritical morality to this sleazy tale, the filmmaker (Fernando di Leo) gets to have it both ways. His camera captures every lurid detail of multiple sex scenes and takes every opportunity to savor the fine flesh of the tasty leads (Gloria Guida and Lilli Carati). He then condemns the women for being "sluts" and brutally reprimands them for their behavior."To Be Twenty" is a highly watchable story about two twenty-year-old free spirits whose youth and naivety bring on their destruction. Ninety per cent of the film graphically depicts the girls in a series of wild and frivolous adventures. Staples of 70's cinema such as drugs, politics, the generation gap, communal living and free sex are thrown into a mix to produce an enjoyable cinematic cocktail that captures the ennui of the period.The film's surprising last stanza sounds a mean-spirited warning to women who freely advertise their sexuality without any intention of providing it. It is a nihilistic, barbaric, angry scene of human carnage that echoes the darkest aspects of "Last House on the Left", "Straw Dogs" and "I Spit On Your Grave".A recurring song is used to potent effect over the end credits and the lead characters are brought to vivid life by the talented Guida and Carati.Recommended.

There are two versions of this film by di leo,a good reliable italian director of usually hard boiled detective films,. The american one has the ending toned down and some sex secenes shortened,the lesbian scenes between Carati and Guida is missing.The opening scene in the italian version has full frontals,missing from the american version.But the big difference is the ending,in the italian version it comes out of the blue.Its nasty vicious and never ever to be forgotten. So you have been warned.THat scene where the camera pulls away from the violated dead naked bodies in the woods,never to be forgotten