8 1/2
HIS:
Anyone with even a passing interest in cinema should be watching Truffaut, Hitchcock and Federico Fellini without whom there would be no Spielberg, no Lucas and no Scorcese. It’s that simple.
8 1/2 is so adept at showing us the inner psyche of a man. In particular,a creative man, an artist. As Marcelo Mastroianni becomes more and more plagued by visions of the women in his life,he begins to question his reasoning, indeed his very mind.
Sure, it edges towards a surrealist comedy at times and is far better when dealing with drama. It also takes matters a good thirty minutes or so to ‘gel’, but when it does,whew!
The true genius you will find here and nowhere else is the way in which the protagonists inner machinations are spelled out as they actually happen onscreen concurrently. It’s difficult to explain quite how cleverly this is staged, suffice to say we both ‘hear’ and ‘see’ his thoughts on top of the reality happening around him. The scene in the car with the actress (his dream girl) is among the most stunning in cinema for its realism. As she asks him “Is this how it will all end…the movie?”,he replies that he has no answers because he simply doesn’t know! He is clearly speaking on behalf of the director Fellini regarding his own intentions for both 8 1/2 and life itself. Both the director of the ‘film within the film’ and Fellini himself ponder the great question that men must ultimately face….”Can I love just one beauty,thus making it the most important thing in my life; depending on it and sacrificing all other earthly pleasures?”.
The way in which we preserve memory, beauty, loss and love is so profoundly illustrated in pure artistic terms by the great Fedirico Fellini in this almost auto-biographical piece which although verges occasionally on light farce, remains one of the finest ever examples of a mans mind under a microscope.
A.
HER:
Frederico Fellini created this whirlwind film based on his life. Women that come in and out of his life and hold a constant place in his heart. It doesn’t matter if these women are short, tall, blonde, brunette, attractive or not, they all hold something that intrigues and captivates him.
The story which after seeing it, comes up time and time again in films (Synecdoche and the upcoming musical NINE is based on this film). Marcello Mastroianni plays a famous Italian movie director named Guido Anselmi, who finds an idea for a film and starts filming it without knowing where it will go. This begins a drama in his personal life between his cast and crew, and his wife and mistress, a film being made within a film. Reading some history of the making of this film shows that art imitates life since Fellini didn’t have any clue as to where the film 8 1/2 would be headed.
There is a scene that is done incredibly well and it’s a dream sequence of all the women that have come in and out of his life. They all cater to his every whim living together in bliss, and when one woman gets too old for his world, she is shunned to the top floor to live with the other “throwaways”. He wants to be with all these women, and also to be the lead in everyone’s life, but doesn’t want to give anything to them that is inconvenient.
The film has great visuals and is in black and white. It shows moments of greatness, and moments of confusion and strangeness. All in all, it’s a must see as it is one film that mirrors many more to come, and a complete classic!
A- (minus because of poor sound quality, and for some of the confusion)
[...] this isn’t half the film that Fellinis 8 1/2 was(the film upon which the stage musical was based thus leading eventually to this filmed version [...]
Nine « Film Snobs Reviews said this on December 12, 2009 at 9:57 pm |