The last of 100 consecutive movie nights!
8 1/2 (1963) dir. Federico Fellini, starring Marcello Mastroianni, Anouk Aimee, Sandra Milo, Claudia Cardinale. The story of a film director who, with an entire crew and cast awaiting, realizes that he has no idea what to do next. While dodging the everyone’s demands of him and managing his complicated love life, he daydreams about his childhood and imagines scenes for his floundering film.
This is a starkly simple, yet impossibly complex film. I saw it first when I was about 20, and it feels like a different movie with every reviewing.
First of all, it’s stunning. Fellini’s eye for bizarre personalities and surreal locations, the absolutely sublime black and white photography, a whimsically yearning score by Nino Rota, note-perfect performances by Mastroianni and a whole crowd of brilliant actresses, all contribute to this, possibly the most perfectly articulated of his films.
Secondly, it’s true. To some extent. The main character is definitely autobiographical, right down to the hat, and sprang out of Fellini’s own uncertainty after La Dolce Vita. How does a director follow a career-making, internationally lauded, smash hit? Apparently he was in the middle of pre-production when he found he had lost track of what his new movie was about. He considered scrapping everything, then had the idea for this film… So you have to ask yourself, how does a film based on the story of its own making, about making a mess of a movie, become such a masterpiece?
Thirdly, it’s hilarious. 8 1/2 is a stinging, loving vision of the filmmaking process, of all the cast and crew, producer, assistants, agents, publicists, critics, and hangers-on that are involved in the production of a large motion picture. One member of this motley crew I particularly loved was the Critic, brought in to comment on Guido’s script and who loiters about, pontificating endlessly about how terrible everything is.
Fourthly, it’s moving. The wistful scenes of Guido’s childhood and his deceased parents colour the whole proceedings, and, indeed, Guido’s life and work. When he lays out all the problems with the film (and by extension his life) to the actress he hopes will be its saviour (Claudia Cardinale), she simply repeats that the film is about a man who does not know how to love. This is the simple pivot point that will provide the sweetness of the ending. And yet even then nothing is presented simply.
I can’t properly describe a film that I’m still digesting and learning from, but this is essential viewing for those who love film and don’t mind a little bafflement. (“I’m confused and concerned,” said my fourteen-year-old as I showed him the brilliant opening scene.) Fellini’s films can be a mixed bag, but his immense fondness for the human race always shines through.
See this film.
