356. La Dolce Vita (1960)

Running Time: 167 minutes
Directed By: Federico Fellini
Written By: Federico Fellini, Ennio Flaiano, Tullio Pinelli, Brunello Rondi
Main Cast: Marcello Mastroianni, Anita Ekberg, Anouk Aimee, Yvonne Furneaux

FELLINI WEEK: 3 of 7

I can't say that I wasn't warned. When searching for recommendations for which Fellini movies to watch (before I decided to just watch them all), I was told to try and stay away from "La Dolce Vita", for it was one of the director's more complex films that only true Fellini fanatics would appreciate and enjoy. However, I felt that my film watching palate was refined enough that if the film was worthwhile, that I should have no problem enjoying it.

The film follows the main character of Marcello, a photo journalist, as he tries to sort out his life, his loves and his career. He's taken by several women during the course of the film, including a Swedish-American actress, Sylvia, the very wealthy Maddalena and all the while his fiance Emma waits for him at home, ready to give her undivided love to him, although he doesn't want it. He's also troubled by his career, as there is no honor in being a photo journalist and he'd rather be a more artistic writer, than a sleazy celebrity chaser. Many things happen over the course of the film and we follow Marcello through his various activities, like covering a story where some children have claimed to see the Madonna, a visit from Marcello's father and a visit to Marcello's friend Steiner.

The first impression that I get regarding Federico Fellini's work is that he had a lot of things racing through his mind. This would've been a very beautiful film, if we could've kept on the track of Marcello and his different lovers. However, the film strayed into so many different directions that it was hard for me to maintain any level of interest. The film starts out fine, Marcello meets up with Maddalena, they give a ride to a prostitute and while at the prostitute's home, they make love. Following that, Marcello arrives home to realize that Emma, his fiance has overdosed on pills and must be taken to the hospital. So far, so good. Then he meets up with Sylvia and they do their thing, going out for a night on the town and capping it off with a dance in the fountain. I'm still on board at this point.

Then we veer off into a totally different direction and a sizable chunk of the film is eaten up with Marcello covering the children claiming to see the Madonna. While I'm sure there is some significance to that scene, all that it did for me was annoy and bore me and I'm wanting to get back to focusing on Marcello's love life. Then Marcello meets up with Steiner and a big party follows at Steiner's home and we get yet another pointless scene, that eats up a major chunk of film with a lot of intellectuals yakking about God knows what. By this time, they've pretty much lost me, however, we then get a scene where Marcello's father comes to visit and this is a scene that pulled my interests back in, just a little. I thought the scene gave off the emotion of awkwardness, as Marcello was seeing his father in an entirely different way than he had ever seen him before. Then we have the entire scene where Marcello meets up with yet another girl, Nico and they go to a part and hunt for ghosts. Again, they lost my interest and this is another scene that just doesn't belong, in my opinion.

If we could've just stuck to the idea that Marcello was this unhappy guy, with an unhappy love life and an unhappy career and examined that, then we would've had the makings for some gold, because there is no denying the acting talents of the cast involved and I think that plot line and that plot line alone could have been a great film, with some great chemistry, as Mastroianni seemed to have a good deal of chemistry with all the actresses. However, we're forced into several different situations that don't deal with that plot line and thus I find it very easy to believe that this is a film that is very easy to get bored with.

I will say one last thing about Fellini. Never before have I taken a director's work and twisted it and molded it into what I thought it should have been. Usually, when I see a film and I don't like it, I leave it at that. But with Fellini, for some reason, when I watch one of his movies and don't enjoy it, I have a tendency to say "Well that was good, but this would have been better" or "Well that wasn't good at all, it should have been like this". I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing, or if I just see so much potential in Fellini's films and that they could be these masterpieces, but then something is thrown in to throw them off the trail of masterpiece status. Although I did thoroughly enjoy "The Nights of Cabiria", this was definitely my least favorite Fellini to date.

RATING: 2.5/10 In good conscience, that's as high as I can go. Here's looking toward "8 1/2" and hoping it "WOWS" me.

MOVIES WATCHED: 151
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 850

September 25, 2010 5:12pm