Plot

Jep Gambardella has seduced his way through the lavish nightlife of Rome for decades, but after his 65th birthday and a shock from the past, Jep looks past the nightclubs and parties to find a timeless landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty.

Journalist Jep Gambardella has charmed and seduced his way through the lavish nightlife of Rome for decades. Since the legendary success of his one and only novel, he has been a permanent fixture in the city's literary and social circles, but when his 65th birthday coincides with a shock from the past, Jep finds himself unexpectedly taking stock of his life, turning his cutting wit on himself and his contemporaries, and looking past the extravagant nightclubs, parties, and cafés to find Rome in all its glory: a timeless landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty.—Jon Mulvaney

Jep Gambardella is an arrogant, futile Italian journalist who becomes famous with his only bestseller, then spends his life in Rome's high society, going to parties and writing social columns. After his 65th birthday, he learns that his first sweetheart died and she had loved him her entire life. This discovery makes him bitter with his empty life and friends.—Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Overlooking the eternal Colosseum, the moonlit terrace of the cynical intellectual and fiercely fashionable king of decadent Rome's nightlife--one-off novelist Jep Gambardella--is the ideal place to contemplate about life, mortality, art, and the fleeting youth. For decades, the elegant sexagenarian journalist has been living in an endless party; however, the invincible death is here to remind Jep that all good things must come to an end--including his lavish but superficial lifestyle. Now, intimate but temporary acquaintances attempt to stimulate the perpetually-uninspired writer, but in the endless search of undiluted beauty, one needs an awakening--even a rude one.—Nick Riganas

After his 65th birthday, Jep Gambardella, an aging intellectual and one-time writer, decides to dedicate his life to the search of a meaning. On the background of a mysterious and wonderful Rome, our main character slowly rediscovers beauty under the monotonous, empty shell of a lifetime between sinners. Following a boring night spent between the sheets of a boring and egocentric rich woman from Milan, Jep decides to stick on a quieter quality of life, but several, casual, meetings will force him to reconsider his priorities. A stripper on the verge of breakdown, the ex-husband of his first love, a bizarre magician and a living Saint from a far away reality, will soon allow Jep to discover his own, personal, Great Beauty.