Caterina Va In Città, or as they’ve translated it for English-speakers, Caterina in the big city, is another gem starring Sergio Castellito. Watch “Non ti Muovere” and then “Caterina Va in Città”, one right after the other, and Castellito’s talents as an actor are obvious. He plays Giancarlo, a narcissistic teacher who decides that his talents are being wasted out in the sticks – his little home town – and moves his family to Rome. One of the best scenes in the whole movie is at the very beginning as he makes a little “screw you” speech to his students on his last day in class. He says, “ …I wanted to tell you all one thing – that all the hours that we’ve spent together in this classroom have been the most useless and depressing of my life and I wonder why we bothered coming to this school accomplishing nothing – particularly for you all, in my humble opinion. You are absolutely unsuited for any kind of education. And in conclusion…”

And then the bell rings, and everybody runs out of the room, obviously not at all affected by their teacher’s hatred for them.

Giancarlo’s wife is played by my favorite, Margherita Buy(Days and Clouds), and again the acting is outstanding. Margherita plays a housewife that has gone a little batty trying to take care of her self-centered husband and their daughter, Caterina. Caterina is played by an amazing young actress named Alice Teghil, who did a few things after this movie and then kind of disappeared – that happens so often with child actors and actresses in Italy. It must be that they go on to university and become something else rather than go on to ruin their lives like Lindsay Lohan and other American child actors.

Giancarlo’s struggle to make it big in the city is interesting, but the real story is with Caterina, who gets thrown to the wolves in an upscale Roman high school. This is “Mean Girls” Italian style. Caterina must make up her mind; is she one of the vapid, snobby mean girls or an intellectual, wild mean girls? Being herself, the girl who loved music and played with her cousin, isn’t going to work here in Rome, so she experiments with lifestyles; she shops, drinks, giggles, and quotes Marx until she’s almost not Caterina at all anymore. All the while, her parents are too busy with their own stuff to even notice.

Directed by award-winning director Paolo Virzì ( La Prima Cosa Bella), this is the best “coming of age” movie that I’ve every seen.

Read my review HERE.

Rent it from Netflix.

Buy it from Amazon.

Enjoy the trailer, without subtitles (sorry!).