Amarcord (1973)

Fellini's fourth win in the category and his warmest film. The title means "I remember" in the dialect of Romagna, and it plays like a year of half-true memories from a seaside village near Rimini in the 1930s, seen through the teenage Titta, his shouting family and a gallery of local eccentrics. What makes it more than nostalgia is how it shows ordinary people drifting into fascism with a shrug and a parade. Episodic rather than plot-driven, so it suits a relaxed evening; the snowfall, the passing ocean liner and Nino Rota's score are the moments people carry away.