Wednesday, June 7, 2017
158 - Juliet of the Spirits, 1965, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
This film is dazzling.
Three things: Production design. Production design. Production design.
Fellini makes a feature film in color. Brilliant, beautiful color.
And he is still firing on all cylinders.
When we watched Contempt (1963) a few weeks ago, we saw the French director Jean-Luc Godard place his story in Italy, at the great Cinecitta Studios. He showed Cinecitta closed. Broken down. In decay.
Godard believed that cinema was dead and he wanted to prove it.
Yet here we have a two-and-a-half hour epic fantasy filmed two years later not on location but almost entirely on sound stages. At the great Cinecitta Studios. Cinecitta was alive and well. And still is today. And pumping out films.
Godard lied.
In Juliet of the Spirits, Fellini's wife Giuletta Masina is back. She plays the wife of an unfaithful husband, who wants to leave him but cannot.
Much of the film takes place in her dream world or in the fantasy world of the spirits that she consults for assistance.
Fellini reminds us that cinema is about images. That the word movies is short for moving pictures. And he gives us picture after picture after picture. Once again--
Every frame a Fellini.
Wednesday, June 7, 2017
Tuesday, June 6, 2017
157 - 8 1/2, 1963, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Tuesday, June 6, 2017
157 - 8 1/2, 1963, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
This traffic is a nightmare.
From which Guido cannot wake up.
Everyone is just sitting there.
And behaving rather strangely.
Guido is born from his car. Coming out headfirst through the sunroof.
He floats. Above the traffic. Floats up into the sun. Like Icarus.
Pulled down by an agent and press agent, pulling on his rope. Yanking his chain. Pulling him down into the surf.
Guido is a film director. And he is having trouble with his next film.
The doctor prescribes 300 ml of holy water. Three doses taken in 15-minute intervals.
Carini the film critic advises him on his script.
He goes to a spa.
The camera pans grandly across a display of complex choreography. The people at the spa all hitting their marks on cue.
The score soars.
The Ride of the Valkyries.
The Barber of Seville.
Claudia comes smiling. Claudia Cardinale comes running. Offers water. Perhaps she is the solution. The Ideal Woman.
Carla comes calling. His mistress from Rome, Sandra Milo, comes by train. Why did I invite her? He puts her up in an off-the-beaten-path hotel to keep her out of sight.
Luisa comes to visit. His separated wife, Anouk Aimee, comes to see him. They go dancing. Maybe things will work out.
Rosella comes with Luisa. Luisa's friend, Rosella Falk, listens to Guido's confession. He wants to make an honest film but has nothing honest to say.
The crew comes to the hotel. Let us get this movie started!
They will film at the beach. At a steel tower structure. Designed to resemble a rocket launch pad.
Guido has memories of his childhood. His grandmother's villa. The prostitute on the beach. His Catholic upbringing.
He has fantasies about the women. All these women complicating his life. If only he could use a whip. Like a lion tamer. A matador.
The Producer shows him screen tests. Make a choice! Guido makes no choices.
Luisa leaves. Claudia appears. Guido shows his movie set to her. She puts him in his place.
Will Guido ever make his movie?
Will he have something honest to say?
Fellini called 8-1/2 "a liberating film."
With it and La Dolce Vita before it we have a world cinema master firing on all cylinders.
He is fully free of the burden of his neo-realism roots. Free to focus on images and sounds. Dreams, fantasies, hallucinations, memories.
And explore the creative struggle.
What does it mean to be an artist? What does it mean to be an artist trying to create in a commercial medium? With the voices of others pulling you in all directions?
The clowns enter playing music.
The artist needs friends.
The artist needs love.
157 - 8 1/2, 1963, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
This traffic is a nightmare.
From which Guido cannot wake up.
Everyone is just sitting there.
And behaving rather strangely.
Guido is born from his car. Coming out headfirst through the sunroof.
He floats. Above the traffic. Floats up into the sun. Like Icarus.
Pulled down by an agent and press agent, pulling on his rope. Yanking his chain. Pulling him down into the surf.
Guido is a film director. And he is having trouble with his next film.
The doctor prescribes 300 ml of holy water. Three doses taken in 15-minute intervals.
Carini the film critic advises him on his script.
He goes to a spa.
The camera pans grandly across a display of complex choreography. The people at the spa all hitting their marks on cue.
The score soars.
The Ride of the Valkyries.
The Barber of Seville.
Claudia comes smiling. Claudia Cardinale comes running. Offers water. Perhaps she is the solution. The Ideal Woman.
Carla comes calling. His mistress from Rome, Sandra Milo, comes by train. Why did I invite her? He puts her up in an off-the-beaten-path hotel to keep her out of sight.
Luisa comes to visit. His separated wife, Anouk Aimee, comes to see him. They go dancing. Maybe things will work out.
Rosella comes with Luisa. Luisa's friend, Rosella Falk, listens to Guido's confession. He wants to make an honest film but has nothing honest to say.
The crew comes to the hotel. Let us get this movie started!
They will film at the beach. At a steel tower structure. Designed to resemble a rocket launch pad.
Guido has memories of his childhood. His grandmother's villa. The prostitute on the beach. His Catholic upbringing.
He has fantasies about the women. All these women complicating his life. If only he could use a whip. Like a lion tamer. A matador.
The Producer shows him screen tests. Make a choice! Guido makes no choices.
Luisa leaves. Claudia appears. Guido shows his movie set to her. She puts him in his place.
Will Guido ever make his movie?
Will he have something honest to say?
Fellini called 8-1/2 "a liberating film."
With it and La Dolce Vita before it we have a world cinema master firing on all cylinders.
He is fully free of the burden of his neo-realism roots. Free to focus on images and sounds. Dreams, fantasies, hallucinations, memories.
And explore the creative struggle.
What does it mean to be an artist? What does it mean to be an artist trying to create in a commercial medium? With the voices of others pulling you in all directions?
The clowns enter playing music.
The artist needs friends.
The artist needs love.
Monday, June 5, 2017
156 - La Dolce Vita, 1960, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Monday, June 5, 2017
156 - La Dolce Vita, 1960, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Paparazzo is a member of the paparazzi.
Of course he is. They were named after him.
Paparazzo is a photographer who runs around with Marcello.
Marcello is a "journalist" who works for a celebrity gossip magazine.
We never actually see him doing any journalism. He simply shows up and watches the photographers photograph celebrities.
Then he hangs out with the celebrities they photograph.
He gets to live the sweet life with the celebrities he follows.
So he himself is sometimes the object of celebrity gossip.
Including the subject of photographs taken by his own friend Paparazzo.
It is a small price to pay for the opportunity to live the sweet life.
La Dolce Vita follows one week in Marcello's sweet life.
He flies in a helicopter following a helicopter carrying a statue of Jesus.
And he takes the time to fly lower to ask for the phone numbers of some women sunbathing on the roof of an apartment building.
And to take the rich socialite Maddalena from the club to the prostitute's flooded basement for their own use while she makes them coffee.
And to hook up with the Swedish-American movie star Sylvia, climbing the stairs in the dome of Saint Peter's, dancing at the baths of Caracalla, and wading in the Trevi Fountain.
He takes her away from her fiancé Robert.
His own fiancée Emma has tried to commit suicide over his philandering, and he has taken her to the hospital to get help.
Marcello, Paparazzo, and Emma drive his Vespa to the countryside where some children say they have seen the Virgin Mary. The crowds are gathered, and mayhem is happening.
He spends a night on the town with his father. They run into Fanny, one of his former flings.
He spends time with his friend and hero Steiner, at a church and at a salon in Steiner's home
He goes to a beach party with his friends, including Nico, later of The Velvet Underground.
Marcello continues to party with rich and famous people. Things happen that surprise and shock him. His life seems empty.
The sweet life is sour.
La Dolce Vita is a masterpiece. With every frame a Fellini.
The film is steadily paced and takes its time. Over the course of three hours, we follow all seven days in Marcello's week.
Each day's story works as a short film unto itself.
Each moment is beautifully staged and beautifully framed.
The actors are fantastic in their roles.
Watching it, you feel that something special is going on. Something magical. You are in the hands of a master at the top of his game.
The music is vital. Both the score and the songs.
The performances at the clubs are their own entertainment.
Many of the set pieces and individual images have become classics.
To see Jesus coming in the clouds--as a statue carried by a helicopter over the ruins of ancient pagan Rome, over the construction of new highrise urban apartments, over the Vatican itself.
To see the stars wading in the Trevi fountain.
And the look of those great cars.
This is a movie to see over and over again.
156 - La Dolce Vita, 1960, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Paparazzo is a member of the paparazzi.
Of course he is. They were named after him.
Paparazzo is a photographer who runs around with Marcello.
Marcello is a "journalist" who works for a celebrity gossip magazine.
We never actually see him doing any journalism. He simply shows up and watches the photographers photograph celebrities.
Then he hangs out with the celebrities they photograph.
He gets to live the sweet life with the celebrities he follows.
So he himself is sometimes the object of celebrity gossip.
Including the subject of photographs taken by his own friend Paparazzo.
It is a small price to pay for the opportunity to live the sweet life.
La Dolce Vita follows one week in Marcello's sweet life.
He flies in a helicopter following a helicopter carrying a statue of Jesus.
And he takes the time to fly lower to ask for the phone numbers of some women sunbathing on the roof of an apartment building.
And to take the rich socialite Maddalena from the club to the prostitute's flooded basement for their own use while she makes them coffee.
And to hook up with the Swedish-American movie star Sylvia, climbing the stairs in the dome of Saint Peter's, dancing at the baths of Caracalla, and wading in the Trevi Fountain.
He takes her away from her fiancé Robert.
His own fiancée Emma has tried to commit suicide over his philandering, and he has taken her to the hospital to get help.
Marcello, Paparazzo, and Emma drive his Vespa to the countryside where some children say they have seen the Virgin Mary. The crowds are gathered, and mayhem is happening.
He spends a night on the town with his father. They run into Fanny, one of his former flings.
He spends time with his friend and hero Steiner, at a church and at a salon in Steiner's home
He goes to a beach party with his friends, including Nico, later of The Velvet Underground.
Marcello continues to party with rich and famous people. Things happen that surprise and shock him. His life seems empty.
The sweet life is sour.
La Dolce Vita is a masterpiece. With every frame a Fellini.
The film is steadily paced and takes its time. Over the course of three hours, we follow all seven days in Marcello's week.
Each day's story works as a short film unto itself.
Each moment is beautifully staged and beautifully framed.
The actors are fantastic in their roles.
Watching it, you feel that something special is going on. Something magical. You are in the hands of a master at the top of his game.
The music is vital. Both the score and the songs.
The performances at the clubs are their own entertainment.
Many of the set pieces and individual images have become classics.
To see Jesus coming in the clouds--as a statue carried by a helicopter over the ruins of ancient pagan Rome, over the construction of new highrise urban apartments, over the Vatican itself.
To see the stars wading in the Trevi fountain.
And the look of those great cars.
This is a movie to see over and over again.
Sunday, June 4, 2017
155 - Il Bidone, 1955, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Sunday, June 4, 2017
155 - Il Bidone, 1955, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Picasso is not a painter.
Picasso is a priest.
Picasso is not a priest.
Picasso is a conman.
Iris is Picasso's wife.
Iris believes Picasso is a painter.
Iris no longer believes Picasso is a painter.
Roberto is a conmen.
Augusto is a priest.
Augusto has a daughter.
How can a priest have a daughter?
Augusto is not a priest.
Augusto is a conman.
Augusto takes his daughter to the movies.
The police take Augusto to jail.
The conman pretends to be a painter.
The conmen pretend to be priests.
The conmen find buried treasure.
Buried treasure on the farmers' land.
The conmen claim it belongs to the church.
The conmen charge the farmers.
The farmers pay the conmen.
Augusto gets out of jail.
The conmen con a family.
The family has a daughter.
The daughter is paralyzed.
Augusto has a conscience.
Augusto says let us return the money.
Augusto does not have a conscience.
Augusto does not return the money.
Augusto tries to keep the money.
Augusto cons the conmen.
The conmen discover Augusto.
The conmen do not wish to be conned.
Augusto lies in the snow.
155 - Il Bidone, 1955, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Picasso is not a painter.
Picasso is a priest.
Picasso is not a priest.
Picasso is a conman.
Iris is Picasso's wife.
Iris believes Picasso is a painter.
Iris no longer believes Picasso is a painter.
Roberto is a conmen.
Augusto is a priest.
Augusto has a daughter.
How can a priest have a daughter?
Augusto is not a priest.
Augusto is a conman.
Augusto takes his daughter to the movies.
The police take Augusto to jail.
The conman pretends to be a painter.
The conmen pretend to be priests.
The conmen find buried treasure.
Buried treasure on the farmers' land.
The conmen claim it belongs to the church.
The conmen charge the farmers.
The farmers pay the conmen.
Augusto gets out of jail.
The conmen con a family.
The family has a daughter.
The daughter is paralyzed.
Augusto has a conscience.
Augusto says let us return the money.
Augusto does not have a conscience.
Augusto does not return the money.
Augusto tries to keep the money.
Augusto cons the conmen.
The conmen discover Augusto.
The conmen do not wish to be conned.
Augusto lies in the snow.
Saturday, June 3, 2017
154 - La Strada, 1954, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Saturday, June 3, 2017
154 - La Strada, 1954, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Gelsomina lives by the sea.
She lives with her mother and she lives with her sisters down by the heart of the sea.
She has no father. Her father is dead. And her sisters come to tell her that her oldest sister has just died.
So Zampano comes to call.
Zampano is a big man who performs in street performances by breaking a chain with his bare chest.
He drives a truck wagon on a motorcycle.
He had married Gelsomina's older sister, and now that she is dead he has come to retrieve Gelsomina.
He pays her mother. Her mother cries but sends her. Gelsomina cries but goes with him.
She watches him perform his act. While hiding inside the truck wagon. He walks around telling the crowds of his mighty feats. He will break the chain with his chest. He breaks the chain with his chest. He passes the hat. He gets a little money.
Gelsomina grows to embrace her new way of life. She plays the snare drum. She plays the trumpet. She clowns. Makes faces. Makes faces with her large and expressive eyes.
And she grows to love Zampano.
And Zampano, perhaps, loves her too. He just does not know how to show it. He bosses her. Scolds her. Is cruel to her.
So one day she discovers his competition. A man walking a high wire tight rope. Named in the film The Fool.
She enjoys his act. Zampano grows jealous. Things get out of hand.
Fellini has created in La Strada one of the world's most beloved films.
His real wife, Giuletta Masina, plays Gelsomina, a character who wears her heart on her face.
The great Mexican actor Anthony Quinn plays Zampano.
The American Richard Basehart plays The Fool.
All three people are simple people. Emotional people. Who live in the world of the street performer.
Watching Fellini is like watching the circus. And a magic show. And a carnival. And listening to a fairy tale. And reading the autobiography of a fictional character. And humming a tune.
He has his own language that is unique to him.
He tells stories in ways that nobody else does.
154 - La Strada, 1954, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Gelsomina lives by the sea.
She lives with her mother and she lives with her sisters down by the heart of the sea.
She has no father. Her father is dead. And her sisters come to tell her that her oldest sister has just died.
So Zampano comes to call.
Zampano is a big man who performs in street performances by breaking a chain with his bare chest.
He drives a truck wagon on a motorcycle.
He had married Gelsomina's older sister, and now that she is dead he has come to retrieve Gelsomina.
He pays her mother. Her mother cries but sends her. Gelsomina cries but goes with him.
She watches him perform his act. While hiding inside the truck wagon. He walks around telling the crowds of his mighty feats. He will break the chain with his chest. He breaks the chain with his chest. He passes the hat. He gets a little money.
Gelsomina grows to embrace her new way of life. She plays the snare drum. She plays the trumpet. She clowns. Makes faces. Makes faces with her large and expressive eyes.
And she grows to love Zampano.
And Zampano, perhaps, loves her too. He just does not know how to show it. He bosses her. Scolds her. Is cruel to her.
So one day she discovers his competition. A man walking a high wire tight rope. Named in the film The Fool.
She enjoys his act. Zampano grows jealous. Things get out of hand.
Fellini has created in La Strada one of the world's most beloved films.
His real wife, Giuletta Masina, plays Gelsomina, a character who wears her heart on her face.
The great Mexican actor Anthony Quinn plays Zampano.
The American Richard Basehart plays The Fool.
All three people are simple people. Emotional people. Who live in the world of the street performer.
Watching Fellini is like watching the circus. And a magic show. And a carnival. And listening to a fairy tale. And reading the autobiography of a fictional character. And humming a tune.
He has his own language that is unique to him.
He tells stories in ways that nobody else does.
Friday, June 2, 2017
153 - I Vitelloni, 1953, Italy/France. Dir. Federico Fellini.
Friday, June 2, 2017
153 - I Vitelloni, 1953, Italy/France. Dir. Federico Fellini.
What does I Vitelloni mean?
The word I in Italian is the definite article. It means the. So we have The Vitelloni.
The i at the end of a word makes it plural. The singular here ends in an e.
So The Vitelloni are a group of Vitellone.
What is a vitellone? A bullock.
What is a bullock? Never mind.
No, that's bollocks. Bollocks are testicles. A bullock is a castrated steer.
So a bullock has lost its bollocks.
OK, enough fooling around. A bullock is a young bull. The name of this movie is The Studs.
Five young men have grown up in a small Italian seacoast town. They are now 30. And they are still trying to grow up.
Although they are not trying very hard.
As long as their families support them, they have other things to do.
Fausto is the player. He marries Sandra in a shotgun wedding. And continues to chase women as she carries their baby.
Moraldo is Fausto's brother-in-law. Sandra's brother. He is the moral one. He wants to get away.
Alberto depends on his sister Olga for money. He is sensitive.
Leopoldo is a writer. He longs for his big break.
Riccardo wants to act and sing.
The movie is a series of scenes in the lives of these men. The beauty pageant that gets rained on. The shotgun wedding. The men taunting road workers. Fausto's leaving his wife at the cinema to chase a lady. Fausto's job at the store for devotional items. Carnival. Post-Carnival. Alberto's sister Olga's running away. Fausto's hitting on his boss's wife. Fausto's firing. The stealing of statue and their efforts to sell it. Leopoldo's meeting with the great actor Sergio and his hopes of his performing his play. Fausto's one-night stand that causes Sandra to run away with the baby. Fausto's search for Sandra. His father Francesco's beating of him with a belt. Fausto and Sandra's reconciliation. Moraldo's leaving by train.
There is something mesmerizing about watching a Fellini film, and his chronicling of life.
Fellini loves life. His characters live life. His movies feel alive.
We have spent weeks watching French films, and now as we are entering into Italian cinema we can feel the differences.
The French films feature the streets of Paris. The Italian films showcase the open square.
Cars are important to French film, as they are in America. In Italian films the people may walk.
The French films focus on the river. The Italian films take place by the sea.
The French films often have loners. The Italian films are grounded in family. Large families.
The French films can be introverted and cerebral. The Italian films can be extroverted and emotional.
Look at map. France is surrounded by land. Except for the south. The Riviera. It has rivers that run through it, which are important to the growth of its cities.
Yet Italy is a great peninsula. Surrounded everywhere by the Mediterranean. Like Florida to us. Only more so. When watching these movies you can smell the salt in the air. You can feel the sand in your toes.
And when we see the architecture of Paris, despite how old it is compared to America, next to Italy it feels young.
The buildings are smashed together. The streets are like narrow channels, pipelines running between the buildings.
But in Italy everything is open. With wide spaces between buildings. Buildings that were built long before French buildings. And people walk everywhere in these open spaces.
There is another difference.
French films feel more secular. Yes, they are Catholic just as the Italian ones. This is the land of Notre Dame.
But religion permeates the very fabric of Italian cinema.
We saw it in Rossellini, and we are seeing it with Fellini. Regardless of the positions of the filmmakers themselves, they are showing religion as being interwoven in their culture.
Fausto the player gets a job at a store that sells Christian items for devotion. Crosses. Candles. Statues. Robes. His boss makes a good living. They have steady and regular customers. The people take it seriously.
When Fausto and Moraldo steal a statue and try to sell it, it is not hard for them to find convents and monasteries for their attempt. They are common.
Consider that there is not a book of Parisians in the Bible.
But there is a book of Romans.
Paul went to Rome. And he wrote his epistolary masterpiece to the church there. And the book of Romans triggered the great revivals of history. From Augustine to Luther to the Wesleys.
And Rome had all that history before then.
The Roman Empire. The Holy Roman Empire. The Roman Catholic Church. The Vatican.
What was going on in France back then?
Compared to America, France feels old. Compared to Italy, France feels young.
Not that the people in these Italian films feel old-fashioned. They are very contemporary.
They just live their contemporary lives in a landscape that has an ancient history.
And we can feel it.
But family is very important here.
Everything revolves around the family.
153 - I Vitelloni, 1953, Italy/France. Dir. Federico Fellini.
What does I Vitelloni mean?
The word I in Italian is the definite article. It means the. So we have The Vitelloni.
The i at the end of a word makes it plural. The singular here ends in an e.
So The Vitelloni are a group of Vitellone.
What is a vitellone? A bullock.
What is a bullock? Never mind.
No, that's bollocks. Bollocks are testicles. A bullock is a castrated steer.
So a bullock has lost its bollocks.
OK, enough fooling around. A bullock is a young bull. The name of this movie is The Studs.
Five young men have grown up in a small Italian seacoast town. They are now 30. And they are still trying to grow up.
Although they are not trying very hard.
As long as their families support them, they have other things to do.
Fausto is the player. He marries Sandra in a shotgun wedding. And continues to chase women as she carries their baby.
Moraldo is Fausto's brother-in-law. Sandra's brother. He is the moral one. He wants to get away.
Alberto depends on his sister Olga for money. He is sensitive.
Leopoldo is a writer. He longs for his big break.
Riccardo wants to act and sing.
The movie is a series of scenes in the lives of these men. The beauty pageant that gets rained on. The shotgun wedding. The men taunting road workers. Fausto's leaving his wife at the cinema to chase a lady. Fausto's job at the store for devotional items. Carnival. Post-Carnival. Alberto's sister Olga's running away. Fausto's hitting on his boss's wife. Fausto's firing. The stealing of statue and their efforts to sell it. Leopoldo's meeting with the great actor Sergio and his hopes of his performing his play. Fausto's one-night stand that causes Sandra to run away with the baby. Fausto's search for Sandra. His father Francesco's beating of him with a belt. Fausto and Sandra's reconciliation. Moraldo's leaving by train.
There is something mesmerizing about watching a Fellini film, and his chronicling of life.
Fellini loves life. His characters live life. His movies feel alive.
We have spent weeks watching French films, and now as we are entering into Italian cinema we can feel the differences.
The French films feature the streets of Paris. The Italian films showcase the open square.
Cars are important to French film, as they are in America. In Italian films the people may walk.
The French films focus on the river. The Italian films take place by the sea.
The French films often have loners. The Italian films are grounded in family. Large families.
The French films can be introverted and cerebral. The Italian films can be extroverted and emotional.
Look at map. France is surrounded by land. Except for the south. The Riviera. It has rivers that run through it, which are important to the growth of its cities.
Yet Italy is a great peninsula. Surrounded everywhere by the Mediterranean. Like Florida to us. Only more so. When watching these movies you can smell the salt in the air. You can feel the sand in your toes.
And when we see the architecture of Paris, despite how old it is compared to America, next to Italy it feels young.
The buildings are smashed together. The streets are like narrow channels, pipelines running between the buildings.
But in Italy everything is open. With wide spaces between buildings. Buildings that were built long before French buildings. And people walk everywhere in these open spaces.
There is another difference.
French films feel more secular. Yes, they are Catholic just as the Italian ones. This is the land of Notre Dame.
But religion permeates the very fabric of Italian cinema.
We saw it in Rossellini, and we are seeing it with Fellini. Regardless of the positions of the filmmakers themselves, they are showing religion as being interwoven in their culture.
Fausto the player gets a job at a store that sells Christian items for devotion. Crosses. Candles. Statues. Robes. His boss makes a good living. They have steady and regular customers. The people take it seriously.
When Fausto and Moraldo steal a statue and try to sell it, it is not hard for them to find convents and monasteries for their attempt. They are common.
Consider that there is not a book of Parisians in the Bible.
But there is a book of Romans.
Paul went to Rome. And he wrote his epistolary masterpiece to the church there. And the book of Romans triggered the great revivals of history. From Augustine to Luther to the Wesleys.
And Rome had all that history before then.
The Roman Empire. The Holy Roman Empire. The Roman Catholic Church. The Vatican.
What was going on in France back then?
Compared to America, France feels old. Compared to Italy, France feels young.
Not that the people in these Italian films feel old-fashioned. They are very contemporary.
They just live their contemporary lives in a landscape that has an ancient history.
And we can feel it.
But family is very important here.
Everything revolves around the family.
Thursday, June 1, 2017
152 - Variety Lights, 1951, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini and Alberto Lattuada.
Thursday, June 1, 2017
152 - Variety Lights, 1951, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini and Alberto Lattuada.
Her name is Lily.
Or Liliana Antonelli, to be exact. But you may call her Lily.
Checco does.
Lily wants to act. On the stage.
Checco is the head--or shall we say, the self-styled smalltime Svengali--of a travelling troupe. A variety show.
They do a little of this and a little of that.
And make a little of money.
Just enough to sneak onto the train and hide so as not to pay the fare.
Liliana goes to the show. The variety show.
She watches. She dreams. She applauds.
One day she will be up there.
Live theater. Singing. Dancing. Acting. Doing tricks. Entertaining the public. Her name in lights.
LIGHTS!
Liliana boards the train.
She sees the troupe on the train.
She gets excited.
She introduces herself to Checco Del Monte.
She shows him pictures.
Lots of pictures.
This is me dancing. Here I am on stage. Look at my outfit. Here, make sure to see this one. See what I can do.
Checco is bored. But he believes he knows how to help her career.
Just not in the way Liliana wants.
She declines.
When the troupe gets off the train they do not have enough money to hire a carriage to take them into the next town.
But Liliana does. She has the last of her money. She spends it to hire the carriage. To take the troupe into town.
They are grateful. She gets to perform.
The audience is sparse. The people are bored. It is an off-night.
Like most of the nights for this troupe.
Until something accidental happens. A happy accident. For Lily anyway.
Someone steps on her skirt and tears it. Now her legs are showing. Suddenly, the audience is interested.
Backstage she gets in trouble. But she protests it was not her fault.
Yet none of the acts are getting any response. And the audience is calling for more of her.
The local promoter wants her on stage. She goes back out. She makes up a dance.
The audience loves her.
The people love Lily.
And you know the rest of the story. As you watch you will think about All About Eve (1950). The stages are in the sawdust of backwater towns rather than the streets of Broadway, but the stakes are just as high.
When someone is willing to do anything to get what he wants, the stakes are high.
Liliana's star will rise. Checco will hitch his wagon to it. Checco's former mistress Melina will move to the background. Checco and Liliana will try to make a go of it.
But Liliana did not come to save of the troupe. She has loftier ambitions than playing in barns.
She wants it all.
And other men can give her more than Checco can.
Fellini had been writing screenplays for a decade.
He had written more than twenty. For several directors. Most famously for Roberto Rossellini.
And with this film he became a director.
He cast his wife and future international star, Giuletta Masina, as Checco's mistress Melina Amour.
And his co-director Alberto Lattuada cast his wife Carla Del Poggio as the star, Liliana Antonelli.
Lattuada brought the drama.
Fellini brought the comic playfulness.
And worked in some of the themes for which he would become legendary.
Vaudeville. A troupe of actors. The vagabond lives of entertainers. The elusive nature of desire.
Human longing. Seen through the eyes of clowning. The three-ring circus of dreams.
A comic look at tragic truths.
A compassionate look at fools.
With a little song and a little dance to wash it down.
Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo! Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo! Doo-doo-doo! Doo-doo-doo-doo!
152 - Variety Lights, 1951, Italy. Dir. Federico Fellini and Alberto Lattuada.
Her name is Lily.
Or Liliana Antonelli, to be exact. But you may call her Lily.
Checco does.
Lily wants to act. On the stage.
Checco is the head--or shall we say, the self-styled smalltime Svengali--of a travelling troupe. A variety show.
They do a little of this and a little of that.
And make a little of money.
Just enough to sneak onto the train and hide so as not to pay the fare.
Liliana goes to the show. The variety show.
She watches. She dreams. She applauds.
One day she will be up there.
Live theater. Singing. Dancing. Acting. Doing tricks. Entertaining the public. Her name in lights.
LIGHTS!
Liliana boards the train.
She sees the troupe on the train.
She gets excited.
She introduces herself to Checco Del Monte.
She shows him pictures.
Lots of pictures.
This is me dancing. Here I am on stage. Look at my outfit. Here, make sure to see this one. See what I can do.
Checco is bored. But he believes he knows how to help her career.
Just not in the way Liliana wants.
She declines.
When the troupe gets off the train they do not have enough money to hire a carriage to take them into the next town.
But Liliana does. She has the last of her money. She spends it to hire the carriage. To take the troupe into town.
They are grateful. She gets to perform.
The audience is sparse. The people are bored. It is an off-night.
Like most of the nights for this troupe.
Until something accidental happens. A happy accident. For Lily anyway.
Someone steps on her skirt and tears it. Now her legs are showing. Suddenly, the audience is interested.
Backstage she gets in trouble. But she protests it was not her fault.
Yet none of the acts are getting any response. And the audience is calling for more of her.
The local promoter wants her on stage. She goes back out. She makes up a dance.
The audience loves her.
The people love Lily.
And you know the rest of the story. As you watch you will think about All About Eve (1950). The stages are in the sawdust of backwater towns rather than the streets of Broadway, but the stakes are just as high.
When someone is willing to do anything to get what he wants, the stakes are high.
Liliana's star will rise. Checco will hitch his wagon to it. Checco's former mistress Melina will move to the background. Checco and Liliana will try to make a go of it.
But Liliana did not come to save of the troupe. She has loftier ambitions than playing in barns.
She wants it all.
And other men can give her more than Checco can.
Fellini had been writing screenplays for a decade.
He had written more than twenty. For several directors. Most famously for Roberto Rossellini.
And with this film he became a director.
He cast his wife and future international star, Giuletta Masina, as Checco's mistress Melina Amour.
And his co-director Alberto Lattuada cast his wife Carla Del Poggio as the star, Liliana Antonelli.
Lattuada brought the drama.
Fellini brought the comic playfulness.
And worked in some of the themes for which he would become legendary.
Vaudeville. A troupe of actors. The vagabond lives of entertainers. The elusive nature of desire.
Human longing. Seen through the eyes of clowning. The three-ring circus of dreams.
A comic look at tragic truths.
A compassionate look at fools.
With a little song and a little dance to wash it down.
Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo! Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo! Doo-doo-doo! Doo-doo-doo-doo!
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