Tag: Federico Fellini

Rapid Response: Juliet of the Spirits

If “Juliet of the Spirits” is Fellini’s love letter to his wife Giulietta Masina, then it is the strangest love letter ever made. This remarkably surreal film with its haunting spectral beauty is a deliciously maddening portrait of love as seen through an other worldly lens of spirits, memories and religious symbolism.

A number of critics sight this film as the start of Fellini’s decline as a filmmaker, saying that “Juliet of the Spirits” lacks the autobiographical poignancy of his masterpieces “La Dolce Vita” and “8 1/2.” “Juliet of the Spirits” was made right after “8 1/2” in 1965, and it’s been said that this film is so frustrating because it feels like Fellini is going on autopilot with half baked visuals and symbols designed precisely to recall his previous films.

Yet Fellini just running on autopilot is a thousand times better than hundreds of other directors working at full capacity, and “Juliet of the Spirits” is so affecting because despite all the criticisms, it remains remarkably exotic, strange, nonsensical and yet all so infectious. Continue reading “Rapid Response: Juliet of the Spirits”

Rapid Response: La Strada

Federico Fellini was put on the map as one of the world’s finest auteurs with his wide array of masterpieces from the ’50s, and “La Strada” is considered one of his finest.

It tells the story of a poor girl, Gelsomina, who learns her sister has died on the road with a traveling sideshow performer. Zampano, the performer with the lungs of steel, pays Gelsomina’s poor family 10,000 lire for her to come away with him, and she goes off into the world as a naive and simple girl ready to learn her life lessons. She loves being on the road and being an artist, but she dislikes Zampano, who’s cruel, insensitive and beats her.

The film is about how she learns to find her freedom and how everyone has a purpose, but she begins the film as no more than a loyal dog or a sheep, as Fellini so unsubtly refers to early on. A lesser film would make Zampano strictly one dimensional and would also be incapable of handling the amount of melodrama that in Fellini’s hands is perfectly convincing, natural and touching.

It also works because of Gelsomina’s (Giulietta Masina) wide range of expressions and emotions conveyed so simply by her. As a clown in Zampano’s show, she somehow reminded me of a female Chaplin. She’s often without words, has a warm and inviting smile and a pout that’s to die for. She’s a unique character who you can’t help but love and feel the deepest of empathy for.

“La Strada” is a moving and heartbreaking film once revered as one of the best ever made. It’s a must see.

Rapid Response: Amarcord

“Amarcord” is a smattering of Italian family life in a small town as recalled in autobiographical form by a director at the end of his career but never more at the top of it.

Federico Fellini’s lovely and hilarious art film, the title of which literally translates into “I Remember,” is an easily accessible and rollicking comedy filled with moments of beauty and empathy.

Some of the moments I enjoyed most were a montage of classroom scenes with a student using a tube of paper to transfer his piss to the front of the class while another is doing a problem at the board. Another was a family dinner moment with everyone lovingly at each others’ throats the way any Italian family would be (We’re not yelling; we’re Italian.). And yet another as a character presumably a young Fellini goes to confession but regrets to tell the priest about all the times he’s touched himself.

All of Fellini’s movies are filled with life and grandeur, even if not all of them are in striking color the way “Amarcord” is. And they’re also all autobiographical in some way, but this is deemed his last masterpiece and one of the best movies ever made because it is a film made by a director considered one of the best of all time around when he made the film who then turned around and made a personal film about all of his joys, fantasies and memories.

It’s a gorgeous film, and probably the best looking comedy ever made outside of maybe “Manhattan.” It’s got all of Fellini’s natural cinematic flourishes and Nino Rota’s enchanting score. “Amarcord” is a real treat, the kind of art film you can show just about anyone and they’ll love, even your Italian mother.