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| censored-03 |
 Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2005 11:09 pm |
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Joined: 24 May 2004
Posts: 3058
Location: Gotham, Big Apple, The Naked City
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| To stretch it even more American Graffiti owes somewhat. |
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"Life is a comedy for those who think and a tragedy for those who feel."
-- Horace Walpole |
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| Rod |
| Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2005 11:12 pm |
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Joined: 21 Dec 2004
Posts: 2944
Location: Lithgow, Australia
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censored-03 wrote: To stretch it even more American Graffiti owes somewhat.
That's not a stretch. It's exact. |
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A long time ago, but somehow in the future...It is a period of civil war and renegade paragraphs floating through space. |
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| censored-03 |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 12:09 am |
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Joined: 24 May 2004
Posts: 3058
Location: Gotham, Big Apple, The Naked City
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What made me think of American Graffiti for some reason was a connection between a focus on a group of youths and how some seek a way out through individualism and others don't even consider trying. Fellini's early enthrallment with American culture as a young man, particularly his adoration (one could call it) for this country's strong individualism, led to a semi-parting with neo-realism for his own ideology of the possibility of individual freedoms for the characters in his films. This is one of the main things that set Fellini apart from the pack IMO and set him up for artistic superstardom in the coming years of the 1950's and 60's, a time when individualism as anti-authoritarianism was becoming probably the most important cultural and artistic under-current. Later in his career it was this same ideology that seemed to put Fellini out to pasture artistically in a time when the concepts of post-modernism rejected the romantic concept of the artist-as-hero. Fellini's individualism has been cited as having a connection to Christian humanism even though he personally hated his Catholic upbringing. The fact that many of his characters are involved in some sort of salvation seem to prove this out.
Because of his early works like I Vitelloni Fellini may have been the first pure art-film director another new concept that came in with his early career. |
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"Life is a comedy for those who think and a tragedy for those who feel."
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 1:53 am |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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I started watching I VITTELONI and just couldn't get into it. It struck me as whimsical neo-realism. The film contains some of the seeds of what made Fellini's later films so wonderful: a love for the human face, festive crowd scenes, small town eccentrics, Nino Rota. But, as I was watching I VITTELONI,
I felt as though I were fullfilling a class project. Life's too short and there's waaaaay too many movies out there. I do love some of Fellini's early films: La Strada, Nights of Cabiria, The White Sheik. But. its the later trippier movies that really rocked my world: 8 1/2, Satyricon, Juliet Of The Spirits,
Amarcord, Casanova...Fellini's more surreal and ornate films were embraced by hipsters of the '60s because they had a psychedelic quality. These are the Fellini films that inspired the term "Felliniesque".
"Fellinesque" being a state of unreality, strange and comical.
By the way, Casanova is not available in any form, but I have a DVD-R copy of a laserdisc version that is a very nice transfer. I will make a few copies and send them to one person to distribute to the members of the society.
Anyone willing to volunteer to distribute them? |
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| lady wakasa |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 9:51 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 5911
Location: Beyond the Blue Horizon
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Marc wrote: I started watching I VITTELONI and just couldn't get into it. It struck me as whimsical neo-realism. The film contains some of the seeds of what made Fellini's later films so wonderful: a love for the human face, festive crowd scenes, small town eccentrics, Nino Rota. But, as I was watching I VITTELONI,
I felt as though I were fullfilling a class project. Life's too short and there's waaaaay too many movies out there. I do love some of Fellini's early films: La Strada, Nights of Cabiria, The White Sheik.
I think I had the same reaction to Feillini's earlier films - I really like La Strada and Nights of Cabiria, but I Vitteloni seems like a first film - very good, but full of promise, not actualities. I think I have the same reaction to Chinatown - because I saw it relatively late, I'd already seen a lot of the films that have taken from it and so it wasn't quite the shock / surprise / explosion that it might've been had I seen it in 1973 (whenever). And my sense is that this is a building block, so I'm looking forward to the next movies.
Marc wrote: By the way, Casanova is not available in any form, but I have a DVD-R copy of a laserdisc version that is a very nice transfer. I will make a few copies and send them to one person to distribute to the members of the society.
Anyone willing to volunteer to distribute them?
I would be willing to distribute - no plans to go out of town, etc in the near future. |
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| Shane |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 10:03 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 1168
Location: Chicago
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| Having endured the Psych-out films of the 60s while altered or not, I will still give a look see to these flicks again with new eyes, I hope! (only in the daytime, my love) |
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I'd like to continue the argument we were having before. What was it about? |
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| mo_flixx |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 10:15 am |
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Joined: 30 May 2004
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marantzo wrote: I just heard something that I didn't know, on the radio. Mastroianni is Greek, from Macedonia.
I just checked this out. There is no mention of it at all on the imdb.com.
According to their bio., Mastroianni was born in Fontana Liri, Italy. His family moved to Turin when he was young. During WWII Mastroianni escaped from a prison camp and spent the war years in Venice. He acted in a drama club there and was discovered by Luchino Visconti.
No mention at all of Macedonia. |
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| lady wakasa |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 10:36 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 5911
Location: Beyond the Blue Horizon
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| Maybe it's Steven Mastroianni, Fine Art Photographer, Cleveland. |
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| censored-03 |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 10:40 am |
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Joined: 24 May 2004
Posts: 3058
Location: Gotham, Big Apple, The Naked City
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PLAYING ON TCM: 05/06/2005 02:15 AM
LA DOLCE VITA |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 10:41 am |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 11:15 am |
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mo_flixx wrote: marantzo wrote: I just heard something that I didn't know, on the radio. Mastroianni is Greek, from Macedonia.
I just checked this out. There is no mention of it at all on the imdb.com.
According to their bio., Mastroianni was born in Fontana Liri, Italy. His family moved to Turin when he was young. During WWII Mastroianni escaped from a prison camp and spent the war years in Venice. He acted in a drama club there and was discovered by Luchino Visconti.
No mention at all of Macedonia.
Mo, this bit of information came up in an interview with an international resteraunteur. He was telling a story about when Marcello ate at his place and asked for a lamb dish that was a dish from a certain part of Greece. He said, "Of course Marcello was Greek, from Macedonia." I'm pretty sure the resteraunteur was a Greek Canadian. Maybe it was Mastoianni's parents who were from Greece. I'll check it out. |
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| Marilyn |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 11:18 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 8210
Location: Skokie (not a bad movie, btw)
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| I very much like I Vitelloni, perhaps precisely because it is not Felliniesque. It seems very Italian to me, very specific about the choices that many rural and small-town Italian men had at the time. I like how it located the young men in a very specific place, something all good neorealist films do. That's one of the things I love about film--it's ability to capture graphically a place in time and give me a chance to know what it might be like to live there. The further Fellini got away from reality, the less successful he was for me. I find his imagery and feelings to be difficult to relate to without a strong reality anchoring them. Perhaps that is my limitation. I do want to try again with his more fantastical films. To me, they seemed rather empty. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 11:22 am |
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Quote: I do want to try again with his more fantastical films. To me, they seemed rather empty.
Its a state of mind. |
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| Marilyn |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 11:24 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 8210
Location: Skokie (not a bad movie, btw)
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| You're probably right, Marc. I know your love for imagistic films. I find that I'm more attracted to realism. |
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| censored-03 |
| Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 11:35 am |
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Joined: 24 May 2004
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Location: Gotham, Big Apple, The Naked City
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Marilyn wrote: Quote: I find his imagery and feelings to be difficult to relate to without a strong reality anchoring them. Quote: it's ability to capture graphically a place in time and give me a chance to know what it might be like to live there
Marilyn I would think for these reasons you would or will like Amarcord. Fellini goes back to this place in time you speak of in I Vitteloni. Fellini seems to juggle both of his cinematic worlds with Amarcord, to me his masterwork. Of course having grown up for much of my youth in Europe it's charm speaks to me more than some. |
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