Andrew Worsdale
`If I have to be really truthful, I can’t say a director can really know why he makes his pictures … On set, I prefer to go on like a blind man, following with the imagination of the picture to delude myself I am going in the right direction.” So said Italian film director Federico Fellini in an interview.
Fellini has often been accused of being overly self-indulgent. There are no half-measures when it comes to his work. Obsessive, single-minded and technically masterful – you might love him or loathe him, but you cannot ignore his conjuring of movie tales into a circus-like orgy.
The Italian embassy, Cinecitta (Fellini’s favoured studio), Alitalia, the Italian Institute of Culture and the Italian South African Cultural Centre are currently holding a retrospective of this masterful director’s work. The films being screened at Ster Kinekor cinemas are:
81/2 (1963). Arguably Fellini’s greatest film, this autobiographical work stars Marcello Mastroianni as a director suffering from writer’s block and wrestling with his conscience. He reflects on his life and the women he has loved and left. It’s a masterpiece of self-referential allusions. With Nino Rota’s dazzling score and Gianni di Venanzo’s luminous camerawork, it is cinematically spellbinding.
And the Ship Sails On (1984). A luxury liner sets sail from Italy on the eve of World War I. On board is an array of opera singers, actresses and nobility. Things take a nasty turn when the captain picks up a group of Serbian refugees. This nostalgic film has all the hallmarks of Fellini’s style and a unique charm.
Boccaccio 70 (1972). This portmanteau film has a great sequence by Fellini, which has Anita Ekberg stepping out of a billboard poster to torment a puritan. It is beautifully staged and, unlike most movies, is short and to the point.
Casanova (1976). In one of Fellini’s most derided works, Donald Sutherland stars as the libertine seducing all and sundry. The question arises in the film whether the character is a real person or a figment of the imagination. It’s sexy and interesting, but certainly not one of the director’s best works.
The Clowns (1970). A touching documentary tribute to the circus world. Made for television, it’s a personal insight into Fellini’s mind and his love of carnival.
Ginger and Fred (1986). This is a sweet, almost intimate outing for Fellini. Giulietta Masina (Fellini’s wife) and Marcello Mastroianni are old actors re-united from their music-hall days for a television show. Fellini paints a sarcastic picture of the way television degrades us, but also shows us there’s some magic in those who devolve into television-show acting.
I Vitelloni (1953). Possibly his most neo-realist work, this bleakly funny story is about five aimless young men trapped in an Adriatic town who lust after women. It’s regarded as one of Fellini’s least ostentatious and most touching works.
Juliet of the Spirits (1965). A woman has recurring visions and mystical experiences to help her gain the strength to leave her husband. The manner in which Fellini interweaves the different strains of imagery makes this a beauty to watch.
La Dolce Vita (1960). Mastroianni stars as a sleazy journalist who beds socialites in an act of attraction and repulsion. He becomes obsessed with an actress (Anita Ekberg) and starts believing the media hysteria surrounding a supposed sighting of the Virgin Mary. One of Fellini’s most bizarre and extravagantly visualised pictures, it’s a delirious depiction of decadent society.
Orchestra Rehearsal (1978). An orchestra assembles in a chapel in what is a low-key parable about musicians intent on anarchy. Made for television, its small scale seems strange for Fellini, but he still manages to sting with satire and eccentricities.
Fellini’s Roma (1972). One of Fellini’s most self-indulgent works, this is a mock-documentary tour of his view of Rome. There’s very little plot, but the traffic jam in a thunderstorm and the Vatican fashion show proves he’s a complete master at visual coups.
Satyricon (1969). A free-form adaptation of Petronius’s tales of Rome – it’s about bisexuality, castration, impotence and hedonism. It’s a freewheeling period film, centred on the friendship of two students. It’s enough to say this is one of Fellini’s greatest films.
The Swindle (1955). This mostly neglected film features Broderick Crawford and Richard Baseheart as parochial conmen who pose as priests. The film moves from quirky comedy to tragedy. For once Fellini is really telling a story and not just tripping around one.
The White Sheik (1951). This is a charming comedy is about a newlywed couple who arrive in Rome, with the wife yearning after the star of a photographic comic strip. She meets him and discovers a tacky hack actor while her disconsolate husband meets a sweet prostitute. It’s funny, incisive and delightfully satirical.