ESSENTIAL FELLINI: Blu-ray (Cineriz, Pathé Consortium Cinéma, PIC Distribuzione, Paramount, Warner Bros. 1950-87) Criterion
“It’s not enough to call Fellini a filmmaker—he was a
maestro . . . He was cinema. Fellini’s work is like a treasure chest. You open
it up and there’s a world of wonders—sparkling visions of beauty, terror,
absurdity—where the ancient and the modern become one, where all the barriers
between reality and fantasy just shatter before your eyes.”
—Martin Scorsese
Celebrating Federico Fellini’s 100th
anniversary is a bit like holding a candle-light vigil for Jesus Christ on
Easter Sunday. Indeed, in the cinema firmament, Fellini remains a god-like
figure by which all other aspiring film-makers may be judged as they endeavor
to touch even the hem of his rich and varied tapestries, cut from life. The
true merit of Fellini’s prowess as a picture-maker lies not, perhaps, in the
expertly composed visuals (although, these are plentiful and celebrated), nor
the extraordinary verisimilitude in the acting (even as this too is ever-present
and accounted for), or even, in the mesmerizing way Fellini takes the artifice
of his craft to the nth degree to illustrate the finite absurdities and
superficiality of man-made ‘life’. Rather, Fellini’s art emerges in the purest
and most uncanny way all of these elements conspire to reveal to the audience an
even more complex and heart-breaking reality to the human condition; terrific,
tragic, and tantalizing – even at a glance.
Fellini’s art always skirted between the sacred and
the profane (one of the big reasons his work frequently came under scrutiny from
the Catholic church), employing a curious liquidity between those fixed
variables of masculine and feminine, while challenging the differences, as well
as the similarities betwixt the peasant and upwardly mobile, intellectual classes.
It is more than a little difficult to classify Fellini’s art, as his
distinctive style simultaneously flirts with elements of the fantastic – a sense
of the miraculous (even, the miraculously obscene) in the every day, and, flamboyant
fantasies, coupled with a sense of crass earthiness, uncannily to diffuse their
fragile sense of mawkish entitlement. No one could ever confuse Fellini of
being a sentimentalist. And yet, there is great sincerity, even tearfully
wrought passion, to emerge from his movies, almost unexpectedly, and certainly,
with the utmost care and respect paid to the audience, never to deliberately
pluck at our heartstrings.
In the years since his passing in 1993, the world has
only become a little more Fellini-esque by its own design, the grand master, clear-eyed
and capable of invoking man’s incongruous inhumanity towards his fellow man,
decidedly ahead of his time. Indeed, Fellini’s most celebrated works, like 1960’s
La Dolce Vita, or 1963’s 8 ½ remain cultural touchstones in
Italian cinema, with an international following to rank them among the greatest
achievements ever committed to celluloid. And if imitation remains the cheapest
form of flattery, then respect to Fellini has been extremely well paid by the
countless homages to his exalted craft, even in his own time; Nights of
Cabiria (1957), as example, becoming Bob Fosse’s Sweet Charity
(1969). Fellini might have begun his
career under the auspices of just another Italian neorealist, but he soon
discovered his own noninterventionist’s approach to creating hallucinogenic and
controversial daydreams and nightmares, his real métier, culled from a
reconstitution of his own memory and/or obsessions. While his earlier movies
refrain from that fête into the phantastic, his latter efforts are all about
reconciling this weirdly wonderful waltz through the hours with that grittier
patina of post-war life, also to have spun wildly out of control.
In hindsight, there was nothing extraordinary about Fellini’s middle-class upbringing in Rimini to suggest a highly stylized visual artist was in the making. His father, Urbano, was of the peasant class; his mother, Ida Barbiani, the bourgeois – a match not approved of by her parents. Although an attentive student, there was nothing particularly prepossessing about Fellini’s formative years or education. In Mussolini’s Italy, Fellini and his brother, Riccardo became compulsory members of the Avanguardista. And although virtually all of Fellini’s movies would crib from some portion of his childhood and youth, he staunchly insisted any direct comparison between his life and those adapted for the screen was purely coincidental. Despite becoming a co-owner in a semi-lucrative portraiture shop in 1937, at the behest of his parents, Fellini enrolled in law school in Rome at the cusp of WWII, although there is no proof, he actually attended classes. Desperately poor, Fellini then found work as a cub reporter covering local court news – which he considered a bore. Publishing his first substantial article in Marc’Aurelio, an influential biweekly magazine devoted to ribald humor, Fellini then, expanded his horizons, endeavoring to begin writing screenplays while still in his late teens. His first screen credit appeared on Mario Mattoli’s Il pirata sono io, its success leading to a spate of like-minded contributions for various directors working at Rome’s renowned Cinecittà Studios. While attempting to dodge conscription, Fellini met his future wife, Giulietta Masina – the two, toiling in radio. But in Nov. 1942, Fellini was drafted, and sent to Libya where he was assigned to craft the screenplay for Osvaldo Valenti’s I cavalieri del deserto, an assignment he soon found himself co-directing. This was the beginning of Fellini – filmmaker.
Apolitical, Fellini was liberated from the draft when an Allied air raid over Bologna destroyed his medical records, he and Giulietta taking refuge in her aunt’s apartment until Mussolini’s fall in 1943. After the Allied liberation, Fellini became involved with the Neorealist movement via his friendship with director, Roberto Rossellini, earning him an Oscar nomination (shared with Sergio Amidei) for his work on Rossellini’s most celebrated post-war pic, Rome: Open City (1945). Three years later, Fellini arguably met his muse in actor, Marcello Mastroianni, then appearing in a play with Giulietta. Then, in 1950, Fellini co-produced and co-directed Luci del varietà), his first feature – and, not coincidentally, the first movie to be included in Criterion’s compendium of his work. The picture follows a troop of travelling performers, among them, both directors’ wives as they struggle to keep body and soul together. Foreshadowing the movie’s own box office failure, the members of this creative entourage are beleaguered by dwindling profits, even as their aged manager, Checco Dal Monte (Peppino De Filippo) falls hopelessly for the newcomer, Liliana (Carla Del Poggio), and, much to the chagrin of his mistress, Melina Amour (Masina). Imploring Checco to accept her into their menagerie, Liliana saves everyone a little shoe leather by hiring a carriage with the last of her money for the duration of their journey. Alas, at the next stop, Checco and his band of merry makers are met by an unusually hostile crowd who mock their performance – all except for Liliana, who proves popular. Realizing he has fallen in love, Checco abandons Melina to pursue Liliana. Nevertheless, he implores Melina to loan him the funds to launch a new show with Liliana as his star attraction. And although Melina lends the money, bitterly to leave with her heart broken, Checco soon discovers Liliana has instead signed with a competitor. The movie ends with a brief showcase of Liliana’s rise to fame, and Checco briefly glimpsing her, bedecked in a posh fur, boarding a first-class compartment for Milan while he is collecting his old troupe, departing for Foggia. In the final moments, we witness Checco and Melina, seemingly having reconciled, but with Checco now flirting with a new young woman sitting across the aisle, suggesting the whole cycle of his feckless heart is about to be repeated.
The financial failure of Luci del varietà
bankrupted Fellini, who incurred a mountain of debts he continued to pay well
into the 1960’s. Fellini next project, 1952’s The White Sheik, marked
his solo career as a director. Revised from a treatment by Michelangelo
Antonioni, and, based on a photographed cartoon strip romance, made popular in
Italy at the time, producer, Carlo Ponti commissioned Fellini and Tullio
Pinelli to write a new screenplay, rejected outright by Antonioni. From here,
the story evolved with the aid of Ennio Flaiano into a light-hearted satire
about newlywed couple, Ivan (Leopoldo Trieste) and Wanda Cavalli (Brunella Bovo)
who desire an audience with the Pope in Rome. Ivan's faux respectability is
soon shattered when Wanda develops an infatuation with matinee idol, Fernando
Rivoli, a.k.a. the White Sheik (Alberto Sordi). Rivoli’s Rudolph Valentino-esque
charm is an elixir to Wanda, who forsakes her husband to pursue a more
passionate romantic dalliance. The rest
of the movie is essentially a series of hilariously executed sight gags as Ivan
desperately tries to conceal his wife’s absence in the presence of their prudish
relatives, detained and finally derailed in their aspirations to visit the Holy Father.
Fausto begrudgingly takes a job as a stockroom assistant in a shop owned by Michele Curti (Carlo Romano), where he shamelessly flirts with other women, even in his wife’s presence. At a masquerade ball, Alberto learns his sister is running off to be with her lover, while a bewitched Fausto is drawn to the dazzling beauty, Giulia Curti (Lída Baarová). She chides his feeble attempts at seduction, resulting in his dismissal from work, and the theft of a gold angel Fausto hopes to sell to a monk, but winds up donating to a simple-minded peasant (Silvio Bagolini) instead. Meanwhile, Leopoldo is unexpectedly propositioned by Sergio. Discovering her husband’s infidelity, Sandra leaves home with the baby. Now, Riccardo, Alberto, Leopoldo, and Moraldo help Fausto search for his wife and child. Enraged by his feckless offspring, Francesco whips Fausto with his belt. Reconciled with his wife, Fausto takes Sandra home while a thoroughly disillusioned Moraldo boards the train, finally recognizing his friends are frittering their lives away.
From these first efforts, Fellini launched into an
opus magnum – his first of many, La Strada (1954), a production embraced
with nothing more concrete than a vague tone tinged in melancholy and Fellini
sketching out the details until they crystalized for him in the image of the
lead character, Gelsomina's head, heavily influenced by Masina’s own likeness.
Indeed, the character’s situations, drew on elements from Masina’s own childhood.
For the character of Zampanò, Fellini recalled a womanizing pig castrator from
his youth, someone who indiscriminately bedded and impregnated women without any
consideration for the repercussions. Our story begins as Gelsomina (Masina)
learns that her sister, Rosa has died after going on the road with the
strongman, Zampanò (Anthony Quinn). Gelsomina’s mother (Marcella Rovere)
accepts Zampano’s offer to ‘buy’ her daughter for 10,000 lire. Now, working as Zampanò’s
assistant, passing the hat around during his street performances as a strong
man, Gelsomina’s adolescent nature blossoms.
The Svengali-esque Zampanò's teaches Gelsomina to play
the part of a clown in his act, but is occasionally cruel in his methods of
instruction. Disillusioned by his behavior, Gelsomina runs away, joining with
the likes of another talented street performer, Il Matto (Richard Basehart). Zampanò
reclaims the girl, however, joining the same travelling circus as Il Matto. The
men eventually come in conflict, with Zampanò drawing his knife – an act that
gets both he and Il Matto broomed from the circus. Zampanò is briefly arrested.
Yet, upon his release, he spurns Gelsomina offer of marriage. Still bent on
revenge, Zampanò encounters Il Matto on the open road, striking him severely
and causing his death. As Gelsomina watches in terror, Zampanò conceals II
Matto’s body in his car, pushing it over the side of a steep ravine where it
bursts into flames. Disillusioned with each other, Zampanò abandons Gelsomina
as she sleeps, leaving behind some clothes, a bit of money, and his trumpet.
Time passes. Then, one day, Zampanò hears the sound of a woman warbling a tune
Gelsomina used to sing. He soon discovers the woman’s father took pity on
Gelsomina, whom he discovered on the beach – friendless and alone. And although
kind and caring, nothing he did could derail her self-destruction. She wasted
away and died. Truly heartbroken, perhaps for the first time, Zampanò gets
drunk and wanders the beach.
La Strada was conceived by Fellini, ably assisted by Ennio
Flaiano and Tullio Pinelli - a shooting script that, in its incubation ran some
600 pages long, as every shot was detailed with extensive liner notes. Impressed
by all this preliminary work, producer, Lorenzo Pegoraro offered a cash advance,
but absolutely refused to have Giulietta Masina cast as Gelsomina. As such, Fellini
then turned to producers, Dino De Laurentiis and Carlo Ponti. Alas, De Laurentiis
wanted his own wife, Silvana Mangano in the lead and Burt Lancaster as Zampanò.
Interestingly, Anthony Quinn was unimpressed by the offer to appear in the
picture until he discovered the man who had made I Vitelloni – which Quinn
considered a masterpiece – and the director hounding him to partake of La
Strada were one in the same. As for Richard Baseheart; he became the first ‘international’
star to appear in a Fellini movie. Fellini was actually taken with Baseheart, a
great admirer of his work in 2oth Century-Fox’s Fourteen Hours (1951). While
De Laurentiis begrudgingly agreed to Fellini’s casting of Masina in the lead,
he did try to have her replaced after she twisted her ankle – necessitating a
brief suspension of the shoot. However, after Paramount executives screened the
rushes, Masina could do no wrong and De Laurentiis realized he could not fight
the casting decision any more. Instead, he signed Masina to a contract at 1/3
Quinn’s salary. Despite an extremely tight budget, La Strada shows
Fellini’s first flare for the extravagant. Fellini’s notorious perfectionism
threatened to topple the enterprise. It also put a strain on cast and crew. But
in the end, the results were decidedly worth it.
Strada, it was not nearly as surefooted coming off his follow-up, Il Bidone (1955), the tale of a group of swindlers bilking the naïve agrarians working the fields just outside of Rome with a promise of selling them posh apartment housing. Instead, the proceeds are spent on their own expense accounts, to include slick sports cars, expensive parties and hookers. One of this motley crew, Picasso (Richard Baseheart) feigns fidelity to his wife, Iris (Masina), a ruse deflated when she witnesses him and his cronies during a New Year’s Eve bash. Meanwhile, the leader of the group, Augusto (Broderick Crawford), meets his estranged daughter, Patrizia (Lorella De Luca). Alas, as time has caught up to the scammers, Augusto is arrested and jailed in his daughter’s presence – a heartbreaking turn of events. Later released, Augusto forms a new gang, shamelessly posing as a priest to fiddle large sums from a farming family whose eldest daughter, Marisa (Irene Cefaro) is paralyzed. However, when the other gang members arrive to collect their share from these ill-gotten gains, Augusto suggests he gave all the money back. Disbelieving his claim, the gang pummel Augusto unconscious, discovering the money in his clothes and leaving him for dead at the side of an isolated and snowy road.
In hindsight, Il Bidone was Fellini’s valiant attempt to return to the roots of neorealism. Indeed, Fellini had hoped to cast Humphrey Bogart as Augusto – a decision derailed by Bogie’s lung cancer. In his wake, Fellini chose Broderick Crawford as he seemed to possess that ‘intense, tragic face’ Fellini was in search of. Too bad, Crawford’s raging alcoholism caused repeated delays. But even worse for Fellini was the way the same critics, having hailed La Strada as his masterwork, were now as quick to utterly savage Il Bidone, to the point where after its debut at the Venice Film Festival, it remained quietly hidden from public view, and, not released internationally until 1964. During the autumn of 1955, Fellini endeavored to adapt Mario Tobino’s novel, The Free Women of Magliano, a project almost immediately shot down by his financial backers. It would be two years before Fellini would be ready to debut another movie of his choosing. This, was Nights of Cabiria (1957), produced by Dino De Laurentiis and again, starring Masina, deriving its inspiration from a rather gruesome news report about a woman’s severed head retrieved from a nearby lake; also, some lurid stories regaled to Fellini by a shantytown whore while shooting Il Bidone. Masina is cast as Cabiria whose current live-in lover, Giorgio (Franco Fabrizi) suddenly pushes her into the river to steal her purse. Bedraggled and disillusioned, Cabiria becomes bitter and shuns the advice of her best friend, Wanda (Franca Marzi).
Working as a prostitute, Cabiria witnesses a lover’s quarrel
between famous movie star, Alberto Lazzari (Amedeo Nazzari) and his girlfriend.
Lazzari takes the starstruck Cabiria home. But their flagrante delicto is interrupted
when Lazzari’s girlfriend returns. Cabiria is then drawn to a church procession,
but is instead wooed by another ‘john’ to get into his truck. Nevertheless,
later that same night, Cabiria witnesses a man nobly giving bread to
unfortunates and reasons she will do what she can to lead a more wholesome
life. At a magic show, Cabiria becomes enamored with the ‘Wizard’ (Aldo
Silvani). He hypnotizes her into divulging the particulars of her dreams for
the future. Once stirred from his hypnosis, Cabiria shuns the audience, meeting
a man named Oscar (François Périer) who was in the audience and has been
waiting to talk to her. Slowly, Cabiria begins to trust Oscar. Unhappy chance,
the two are wed before Cabiria realizes Oscar intends to push her into the river
and steal all her money. She grovels at his feet to prevent the inevitable. He
takes her money, but leaves her intact. Now, as she tearfully wanders along the
lonely open road, Cabiria meets young people riding Vespas and playing music.
They form a ring of love around her and she marches along in their impromptu
parade, a smile slowly restored from her sadness.
Now, Marcello meets Steiner (Alain Cuny), an affluent
intellectual who invites him, along with a cohort of sycophants, for a weekend
retreat to his fashionable palazzo. Before this, Marcello, his photog/friend,
Paparazzo (Walter Santesso) and Emma drive to the outskirts of the city to
cover a report about the sighting of the Madonna. But the scene turns ugly,
when the worshippers desperately tear apart a small tree for souvenirs. A bitter
Emma prays to the Virgin Mary to give her sole possession of Marcello’s heart. Instead,
the scene ends when a mother, bearing her sick child to be healed, is instead
trampled to death by the crowd. Now, Marcello and Emma retire to Steiner’s for the
weekend, surrounded by pseudo-intellectuals and the artsy crowd. Emma is
enthralled by what she sees. But Steiner is very moody and confides to Marcello
his fears, that his embrace of the materialistic has sacrificed any hope he may
have had to live a more fulfilling spiritual life with his two young sons.
Seemingly shaken by this revelation, Marcello briefly flirts with Paola (Valeria
Ciangottini), a young waitress at the nearby café. Perhaps fearful he too is
sacrificing too much to embrace the hedonist life, Marcello meets up with his
estranged father (Annibale Ninchi) whom he takes to the Cha-Cha Club and
introduces to Fanny (Magali Noël) a dancer whose picture
he promised, but failed to get in the paper. Fanny takes a liking to Marcello’s
father. Alas, the evening proves too much for the old man who suffers a mild
heart attack. Marcello desperately wants to get to know his father better.
However, the old man recovers and retreats back home, leaving Marcello forlorn.
Marcello, and his cohorts drive out to a castle where the
party-goers are already overwrought with liquor. By chance, Marcello finds
Maddalena, who proposes to him before going off with another man.
Disillusioned, Marcello picks up American artist, Jane (Audrey Macdonald) whom
he beds. At dawn’s first light, the revelers are met by the matriarch of the castle,
on her way to mass with several priests. Preparing their leave, Emma confronts
Marcello in a last-ditch effort to profess the depth of her love for him. As he
finds this smothering intolerable, he throws her out of his car and drives off,
only to return several hours later and collect her along the side of the road.
Some hours later, as Marcello and Emma rest together in bed, Marcello receives
a horrifying phone call, rushing to Steiner’s apartment to discover Steiner has
killed his two children and himself in a fit of melancholia. What follows is a
most unusual fracture in Fellini’s timeline. We rejoin an older Marcello at the
beach house of his friend, Riccardo (Riccardo Garrone)
where a largely homosexual entourage have gathered to celebrate his ex, Nadia’s
(Nadia Gray) divorce. She performs a crude striptease and Marcello, drunk and
out of sorts, endeavors to stir the crowd into a wild orgy. Instead, the party disintegrates
into abject chaos, moving to the beach after Riccardo arrives and ejects
everyone from his home. Paola, still young and vital, calls to Marcello from
across an estuary. Alas, her words are drowned out by the wind and, after making
the feeblest of attempts to understand her, Marcello simply shrugs his shoulders
and walks off with another woman as Paola waves, observing his departure with
an inscrutable smile.
Granted a rare audience with a Cardinal, Anselmi
admits to being deeply discontented. Worse, the Cardinal offers him no solace,
apart from quoting a few catechisms. Now, Anselmi invites his ex-wife, Luisa
(Anouk Aimée) in the hopes she can rekindle his inspiration he desperately
needs to carry on. Alas, here too, he almost immediately abandons her for his
production Confiding in his wife's best friend, Rosella (Rossella Falk) his
desire to make an art that will stand the test of time for both its purity and
honesty, with tragic precision and ill-timing, Carla surprises Guido, Luisa,
and Rosella outside the hotel. Although Anselmi claims to have ended his affair
with Carla years ago, both Luisa and Rosella call him out. Cornered, Anselmi retreats
into a fantasy where he is pampered by a harem of women. Alas, even in this
imaginary realm of his own design, the women berate him with harsh truths,
forcing Anselmi to literally whips them back into shape. Disgusted by his
stalemate, the movie’s producer, Pace (Guido Alberti) insists on reviewing the
screen tests already conducted. But when
Luisa recognizes herself on the screen, represented heartlessly by her husband,
she leaves, declaring their marriage over. Miraculously, Anselmi’s ‘Ideal Woman’
materializes as the actress Claudia Cardinale. She listens to his plans to cast
her in the picture but deduces the male protagonist lacks either a heart or soul
to salvage the movie. Suspending the movie indefinitely, Anselmi is cornered at
a press conference and commits suicide by shooting himself in the head. As the
crew disband, Anselmi experiences an epiphany in which a troop of musical
clowns, led by his younger self, are met by the men and women from his life.
Shouting into a megaphone, Anselmi directs these figures in a re-creation of a
circus – Fellini’s metaphor for life, and Carla returns, accepting of his
decision to take his own life. As the people from Anselmi’s past form a circle
in dance, he and Luisa rejoin them in a celebration.
struggles faced by all creative individuals grappling with their own reputation – a convulsion of the technical and personal angst involved, living with, and under, intense and uncompromising public scrutiny. The picture also marks its territory regarding the disaffecting outcome of modernization. Fellini’s next movie, Juliet of the Spirits (1965) would prove even more challenging, and, in some ways, both a letdown and retread of ideas already more fully expressed in his earlier work. The picture stars Giulietta Masina again, thinly disguised as Giulietta Boldrini, who endeavors to cope with her mundane existence and a philandering and oppressive husband, Giorgio (Mario Pisu) by exploring the odd lifestyle of their glamorous neighbor, Suzy (Sandra Milo) – intermittently adopting the personas of ‘Iris’ and ‘Fanny’. Through these escapist visions, daydreams and fantasies, Giulietta is able to re-channel her own desires and assess her own demons more clearly. As she steadily gains greater self-awareness, she also becomes more independent, although – and regrettably so – never entirely freed from her own life’s dissatisfactions or spouse. Reflecting on Juliet of the Spirits today, one may judge it as the intermediary between all that had gone before it and the creative gestalt about to occur in Fellini’s next endeavor, Fellini’s Satryicon (1969) – not the least, shocking – then – for its homoerotic content. We begin with Encolpius (Martin Potter) lamenting the loss of his lover, Gitón (Max Born) to Ascyltus (Hiram Keller). Encolpius discovers Ascyltus has since sold Gitón to the actor, Vernacchio (Luigi Visconti, a.k.a. Fanfulla). Now, Encolpius finds Vernacchio and Gitón performing a lewd play. Encolpius storms the stage and reclaims Gitón. On their return to home, the couple stroll through a vast Roman brothel, observing various sensual acts in progress and wind up making love. Ascyltus, bitter and jealous, stirs Encolpius with his whiplash, proposing they divide up their property, even splitting Gitón in half. The news is even more devastating when Giton chooses to leave with Ascyltus.
Encolpius meets the poet, Eumolpus (Salvo Randone) who invites him to a banquet at the home of Trimalchio
(Mario Romagnoli), a wealthy freeman, and his wife Fortunata
(Magali Noël). Scandalized by her husband’s attentions
paid to two very young boys, Fortunata berates Trimalchio, who assaults her in
a sea of gizzards and gravy. Trimalchio recites one of his poems, but is
accused of plagiarism by Eumolpus who is then tortured by Trimalchio’s slaves
in a cavernous kitchen furnace. The remaining guests are invited to
Trimalchio's tomb where he enacts his own death with shameless aplomb. Encolpius
departs with the badly injured Eumolpus who is touched by his concern and
bequeaths the spirit of poetry to Encolpius. Now, Encolpius, Gitón, and
Ascyltus are taken prisoner by Lichas (Alain Cuny), as a consignment of
attractive young men for the reclusive Roman emperor. Lichas, smitten by Encolpius’
beauty, takes him for his spouse in a wedding ceremony blessed by his wife,
Tryphaena (Capucine). Alas, tragedy awaits as the emperor’s isle is overrun by a
perilous coup. The teenage emperor (Tanya Lopert) commits suicide and Lichas is
beheaded as Tryphaena looks on with supreme satisfaction. A new Caesar (Alvaro Vitali) holds court, allowing Encolpius and Ascyltus to escape to
an abandoned villa where they make love with a slave girl. Fleeing for their
lives, Ascyltus placates a nymphomaniac, then, with a mercenary, murders two
men. Exposed, the mercenary tries to murder his two companions, but is instead
overpowered and killed.
Captured by soldiers, Encolpius is forced to play
Theseus to a gladiator's Minotaur (Luigi Montefiori).
Spared his life, Encolpius is rewarded with Arianne (Elisa Mainardi)
with whom he must fornicate as the crowd looks on. Alas, impotent, Encolpius is
disgraced. Instead, Eumolpus takes Encolpia to the Garden of Delights where
prostitutes are believed to have a magical cure for impotence – the gentle
whipping of the buttocks. This too, however, fails miserably. Within this
narrative, there emerges a second thread about the Garden of Delights; that of
Oenothea (Donyale Luna) and Encolpius. As punishment for having spurned
the sexual advances of a sorcerer, Oenothea is cursed to spend her days lighting
fires from her genitalia. Encolpius and Ascyltus attend Oenothea at her home. She
concocts a potion that restores Encolpius’ sexual prowess. Tragically, Ascyltus
is murdered in an adjacent field. Now, Encolpius rejoins Eumolpus’ ship,
unaware Eumolpus has already died, his heirs eager to devour his corpse. While
possessing no stomach for cannibalism, Encolpius entertains the ship’s Captain
and crew. But his words break in mid-sentence; the scene, abruptly cutting to
frescoes of all of these characters etched in a crumbling wall.
from his decision to tell more intimate, though incomplete, if self-reflexive tales about his own upbringing; the first of these – Roma (1972); a movie so disjointed in its storytelling, it can only be considered as a series of reflections Fellini intended, perhaps to expose his truest self behind the moniker of the artiste. The movie begins with a massive traffic jam and ricochets in its timeline from Mussolini’s Fascist regime in the 1930’s, to Rome, circa, 1972. A young Fellini (Peter Gonzales) moves into a guesthouse populated by decidedly flamboyant and unusual people (including a Benito Mussolini lookalike). The establishment is run by a sickly overweight proprietress. Fellini visits two brothels – the first, derelict and filthy, the other, chic and luxurious. He falls madly in love with Dolores (Fiona Florence) a whore working in the posh establishment. From here, the vignettes become even more grotesquely overwrought and seemingly insignificant, with Fellini encountering the likes of Gore Vidal, Marcello Mastroianni and Anna Magnani (in her final appearance before succumbing to pancreatic cancer, age 65), all playing ‘themselves’. Rome takes center stage, as Fellini explores its vaudeville theaters, byways and ancient catacombs, where ancient frescos are seemingly destroyed by the fresh air soon after excavators have unearthed them. The most famous moment in the picture remains the profligate and thoroughly odd liturgical fashion show given for a Cardinal with priests and nuns, as the show’s roller-skating mannequins. Roma concludes with motorcyclists riding through the city, and an impromptu moment with Magnani – unplanned, but filmed after Fellini and his crew encountered her walking down the street. The actress had barely 3 months to live.
The schoolmaster, Zeus (Franco Magno) presides over a
chaotic classroom, devolving into all manner of pranks instigated by Titta,
Gigliozzi (Bruno Lenzi), Ovo (Bruno Scagnetti) and Ciccio (Fernando de Felice) –
the latter, an obese child harboring a school boy’s crush on Aldina (Donatella
Gambini), a pretty brunette. Inane lessons follow. The art teacher (Fides
Stagni) dips breakfast biscuits in milk, while a voluptuous math teacher (Dina
Adorni) demonstrates algebraic formulas. The Italian instructor (Mario
Silvestri) is ridiculed by Ovo, while a myopic religion instructor, Don Balosa
(Gianfilippo Carcano) drones on as half of his underaged pupils sneak into the
bathroom to smoke cigarettes. As Balosa doubles as the town’s priest, he is
somewhat obsessed with preventing male masturbation. Later that evening,
Aurelio is shocked to discover his son has urinated on a neighbor’s hat. While
Titta and his cohorts trail Gradisca under the promenade, Lallo and his friends
spy a carriage of prostitutes arriving at the local brothel – news indeed, to
spread rapidly among the local male population. The town is whipped into a
nationalist fervor over Mussolini. Not all is well, as Aurelio, betrayed by
Lallo, is brought in for questioning and forced to drink castor oil during his interrogation.
Meanwhile, Gradisca is encouraged to bed a twerp-ish Fascist high official in
return for government funds to rebuild the harbor. The family eventually takes
Uncle Teo (Ciccio Ingrassia), Aurelio's brother, who is in an insane asylum,
out for an afternoon’s liberty. But Teo escapes and is only subdued by a dwarf
nun who manages to call him down from a tree he has climbed.
Titta’s obsession with Gradisca continues as he tries
to con the buxom tobacconist into giving him a cigarette if he can pick her up.
She is amused when the relatively diminutive lad succeeds, and repays his
efforts by smothering him in her breasts, before giving him a cigarette for
free. At summer’s end, Titta falls ill, but is nursed back to health by his mother. With the first snowfall, a friendly snowball
fight breaks out between Lallo, Gradisca, and the schoolboys. A Short while
later, Titta awakens to discover Miranda has died. Overwrought, he locks
himself in the room with the body to grieve. At spring’s first influence, half
the town assemble to celebrate Gradisca’s marriage to the unprepossessing Fascist
officer. Someone inquires what has happened to Titta. The reply, that he has
gone away – likely for good – signals an end to all of these daydreams from
yesterday. The movie concludes with Gradisca and her newlywed husband driving
off as the blind accordion player strikes up a tune.
Fellini-anna nimbly skip past 3 of his most requested latter works, 1976’s Fellini's Casanova, 1978’s Orchestra Rehearsal and 1980’s City of Women. Criterion’s celebration picks up with 1983’s And the Ship Sails On, a sort of sad-eyed nod to Fellini’s distant past remembrances of a life removed from his own. The movie begins just prior to the cruise ship, Gloria N. setting sail from Naples – a sequence tinted in sepia with no sound other than a whirling projector. The aperture advances into full color with the arrival of Orlando (Freddie Jones), a journalist who will act as the narrator of this story. The Gloria’s departure is a funeral voyage to fulfill the last request of Edmea Tetua (Janet Suzman), a famous opera singer who desired her ashes should be spread near her birthplace, the island of Erimo. From here, we are introduced to Ildebranda Cuffari (Barbara Jefford), a greedy soprano, desperate to unravel the secret behind Tetua's unforgettable voice. Sir Reginald Dongby (Peter Cellier), a ghoulish English aristocrat, savors prying into the affairs of Lady Violet, his nymphomaniacal wife (Norma West). Meanwhile, the Grand Duke of Harzock (Fiorenzo Serra), is under siege from his blind sister, the Princess (Pina Bausch) who is scheming to have him disinherited. The brooding Count of Bassano (Pasquale Zito) has isolated himself in his stateroom, transformed into a shrine to Tetua’s memory. The next day, passengers are alarmed to discover a small contingent of Serbs (Elizabeth Norberg Schulz, Bernadette Lucarini, and, Bruno Beccaria) on deck, having fled the assassination or Arch Duke Ferdinand in Sarajevo. Even more alarming is their encounter with the Austro-Hungarian fleet who demand the return of these Serbian refugees. The captain agrees, but only if Tetua's ashes are scattered beforehand. After the ceremony, one of the Serbs hurls a bomb at the flagship, causing a response of cannon fire. The Gloria N. is sunk while Albertini (Paolo Paoloni) conductor of the band, wields his baton, escorting aristocrats in a forced march to the lifeboats. In the final moments, Fellini reveals to his audience the artifice by which the picture has been made – hydraulics to raise and lower the ship on a gimble, and a plastic ocean, into which Orlando finds himself rowing his lifeboat toward an uncertain horizon.
In between ‘Ship’, and ‘Vista’, Fellini shot Ginger and Fred (1986) – a charming reunion picture for Mastroianni and Masina, who proved they still possessed enough intangible chemistry to have made them famous decades earlier. After Intervista, Fellini had only one movie left to make: The Voice of the Moon (1990) a sadly disposable dramedy, based on a novel by Ermano Cavazzoni and heavily influenced by themes less effectively explored than in La Strada. Mortality is a terrible thing, and Fellini’s caught up with him in 1993. During the final years of his life, he had dedicated himself to conducting several lengthy interviews in which he was determined to leave no stone unturned about his professional or personal life. As funding for future film projects dried up, Fellini also turned his attentions to television, producing several made-for-TV releases: Attore, Napoli, L’Inferno, L'opera lirica, and L’America. The year of his death, Fellini was also honored with his 5th Oscar – only now, for lifetime achievement. But in June of that same year an angioplasty for his femoral artery resulted in a stroke, leaving him partially paralyzed. This was followed by an even more devastating second stroke that sent Fellini into an irreversible coma. He lingered until October, quietly dying, age 73 the day after his 50th wedding anniversary. The resultant mourning in Italy saw a record 70,000 attend his funeral. Barely five months later, Masina followed her beloved husband and mentor to the great beyond, succumbing to lung cancer. While artists are often
Criterion’s massive effort to bring together much – if
not all – of Fellini’s masterworks has resulted in a hefty box set, loaded with
extras. Owing to the distributor’s due diligence over the years, only 11 of
these theatrical features have been given ‘new’ 4K restorations, the rest, derived from stellar
work already achieved. Indeed, these aforementioned titles are identical to the
stand-alone discs Criterion originally offered. Too labor intensive to get into
each 1080p transfer independently here. As consistency in this set is
impressive, virtually all of the B&W movies possess stunning 1080p imagery,
capped off by solid black levels, exceptional tonality in the gray scale,
gorgeous detail, and a light smattering of film grain looking very indigenous to
its source. The color features here are, mostly, impressive – the only one to
seemingly suffer, Intervista, owing to its use of varying film stocks to
evoke a documentary feel. That said, the
color features exhibit universal improvements to flesh tones and overall color
balancing and saturation. While many of these movies adopted a curious jaundice-tint
in previous home video incarnations, the new 4K scans have yielded marked improvement
and a cooler palette, in keeping with the more realistic color designs of the
original film stocks. So, cleaner whites, and richer, more vibrant blues,
greens and browns. Virtually all the features here have PCM monaural audio – given
to Criterion’s high standards to preserve the original intent of the
film-maker.
We also get new digital restorations of Fellini’s
short, Toby Dammit (1968) and the television film, Fellini: A
Director’s Notebook (1969), plus feature-length documentaries, Fellini:
I’m a Born Liar (2002) and Marcello Mastroianni: I Remember (1997),
the latter presented in its full and comprehensive 193-minute version. In
addition to all these goodies, we also get the 2-hour/4-part 1960 interview
with Fellini, conducted by André Delvaux and 4 comprehensive behind-the-scenes
documentaries, collectively references as the ‘Reporter’s Diary: “Zoom on
Fellini” (1965), Ciao, Federico! (1969), The Secret Diary of “Amarcord” (1974),
and Fellini racconta: On the Set of “And the Ship Sails On” (1983).
Concluding our look at the maestro is 2000’s Fellini racconta: Passegiatte
nella memoria, and 2004’s Giulietta Masina: The Power of a Smile, a
glowing tribute to the couple’s 50-year collaboration in films and life. Important
to note, all of the extras previously made available on the stand-alone discs
have made the transition here. So, we get Once Upon a Time: La Dolce Vita,
plus 6 audio commentaries to accompany various films in this set, archival interviews
with Fellini, his stars and collaborators, audio only interviews, video essays
and trailers. All of this has been plushily padded in a deluxe box, housing 2
lavishly illustrated books, featuring commentary and notes by scholar, David
Forgacs, Michael Almereyda, Kogonada, and Carol Morley, critics, Bilge Ebiri
and Stephanie Zacharek, and, novelist, Colm Tóibín, with stunningly reproduced
images from Don Young’s distinguished collection of Fellini’s personal effects.
Bottom line: Federico Fellini’s unimpeachable craftsmanship has been given its
due in Criterion’s lavishly appointed box set. It isn’t comprehensive. But why
lament the missing pieces, when what is here is pure movie-land gold.
Very highly recommended indeed!
FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)
1950 Variety
Lights – 3.5
1952 The
White Sheik – 3.5
1953 I
vitelloni – 4.5
1954 La
Strada – 5+
1955 Il
bidone – 3.5
1957 Nights
of Cabiria – 5+
1960 La
Dolce Vita – 5+
1963 8
½ - 5+
1965 Juliet
of the Spirits - 4
1968 Spirits
of the Dead: Toby Dammit - 2
1969 Fellini:
A Director's Notebook - 4
1969 Fellini
Satyricon - 4
1972 Roma
- 3
1973 Amarcord
– 5+
1983 And
the Ship Sails On – 3.5
1987 Intervista
- 3
VIDEO/AUDIO
Overall – 4
EXTRAS
5+++
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