Look inside - Amsterdam University Press

Fellini
1
Fellini
Author and editor
Sam Stourdzé
Editors for EYE
Marente Bloemheuvel
Jaap Guldemond
EYE, Amsterdam
Amsterdam University Press
Contents
Preface4
The Parade of Images
8
Popular Culture
Caricatures, juvenilia
20
The photo-novel
22
Mandrake the Magician
26
The voyage of Mastorna
28
Parades30
Dinners32
The circus
36
Grotesques44
Casting sessions
46
50
The Rugantino
Paparazzi54
Look-alikes60
The Temptations of Doctor Antonio
64
Mock advertisements
66
Fellini at Work
The scriptwriters
The costumes
Behind the camera
Directing actors
Studio 5
The helicopter
70
72
76
80
84
88
The City of Women
Fellini, Catholic filmmaker?
92
Female obsessions
96
Anita Ekberg 102`
Anna Magnani
106
All about posters
108
Prostitutes110
Casanova114
Fellini and his double
116
The myth of the fountain
120
Masina and Fellini
126
Biographical Imagination
Visions130
The Book of Dreams
138
Fellini superstar
144
Appendix
Notes152
Selected bibliography
152
Chronology153
Filmography154
Illustration credits
157
Acknowledgements158
Federico Fellini, 1950s.
of mass media in general: television, newspapers, magazines and advertising.
The age of imagery, in fact. From the 1950s on, audiences, especially in Italy,
quickly fell under the spell of the mass media, enthusiastically embracing the
images that were appearing everywhere. Fellini – who was of course the inventor
of the term “paparazzi” (in La Dolce Vita) – was quick to predict the influence
that the media would exert on human behaviour, and referred to it in his films
(such as the enormous billboard featuring Anita Ekberg, which comes to life in
the anthology film Boccaccio ’70).
Preface
EYE is proud and excited to announce a major exhibition, a publication and a
substantial supporting programme that will be presented this summer, dedicated
to the oeuvre of one of the most defining masters of post-war Italian cinema:
Federico Fellini. His rich and incisive film oeuvre, which has been collected,
preserved and screened by EYE for many years, now will be brought out under
the spotlight on the broader stage of our new museum.
The publication includes four main chapters. Popular Culture concentrates on
Fellini’s many sources of inspiration within the day-to-day popular culture of the
time. This includes not only the steadily more prevalent mass media, but also
such manifestations as the circus, rock music, cartoons and Catholic or political
parades. Fellini at Work shows us the director on the film set, instructing his
actors, working together with costume designers, behind the camera, and so on.
The City of Women concerns Fellini’s most important subject and obsession:
Woman, in all her many guises. Finally, Biographical Imagination presents Fellini
in the guise of various doppelgangers, each reflecting a different aspect of his
personality. Particular attention is given to his ‘Book of Dreams’ in which he
recorded his dreams in words and drawings.
The career of Federico Fellini (1920-1993) lasted for forty years and made him
perhaps the most illustrious of all the filmmakers to have come out of Italy. Those
forty years saw the appearance of titles that have carved out a permanent niche
in the memory of generations of film lovers. The bellowing strongman in La Strada
(1954); the anguished society reporter in La Dolce Vita (1960); the tyrannical
director with the whip in 8½ (1963) or the woman who lovingly clutches the
young boy from the village to her ample bosom: these characters have become
the archetypes who inhabit that universe that we have come to call “Felliniesque.”
A universe in which Fellini’s alter ego appears – often portrayed by Marcello
Mastroianni – in different guises as a participant in an continuous parade of
grotesque human failures.
We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the many people who have worked on this
wide-ranging project. First of all, we should mention Sam Stourdzé who compiled
the (travelling) exhibition and the publication as well as writing the texts for the
publication. NBC Photographie and CaroleTroufleau Sandrin were involved in
the production. The collaboration with Sam Stourdzé was especially inspiring,
and we thank him for his enthusiasm and dedication and for his interesting
concept and approach.
Additionally, the cooperation and support of the Fondation Fellini pour le
Cinéma (Sion, Switzerland), the Fondazione Fellini (Rimini, Italy) and the Cineteca
di Bologna are essential to the success of this and any presentation about Fellini.
Before making his actual debut as a director, Fellini mainly concentrated on
drawing and writing screenplays. He left his birthplace Rimini when he was
nineteen years old in order to “conquer Rome.” For a period, he drew cartoons
for satirical magazines, moving on to co-write numerous screenplays during the
1940s. He was confidant and assistant to Roberto Rossellini during the making of
Roma, città aperta (1945), before making his debut as a director in 1950 with
Luci del varietà. His international reputation was established when he received
an Oscar for La Strada (1954). When he was forty years old, La Dolce Vita
(1960) put Fellini at the centre of great controversy. This “decadent” and
­“blasphemous” film shocked the Catholic Church, which until then had supported
him, even embracing him as a Catholic filmmaker. However, Fellini’s free spirit
continued to guide his career, independently of trends and conventions. 8½
(1963) proved to be yet another watershed, when he decided to ignore all the
rules of storytelling and to jettison any form of logical narrative. His exploration
of the creative process and his reflections on cinema encouraged him to leave the
beaten track of reality and to explore the world of the imagination. Childhood
memories, dreams and the subconscious mind took on an increasingly important
role in his work. His films always had a strong autobiographical element, but
now Fellini no longer had any qualms about playing himself in his films (Blocknotes di un regista, I Clowns, Roma, Intervista).
This book and the exhibition aim to reveal the universe of the filmmaker and the
sources of his rich imagination, and to highlight the essential power of his work.
The story of Fellini’s themes and obsessions is, twenty years after his death, told
by movie stills, set photos and his drawings, as well as by archive material and
posters. The fantasy world of Cinecittà, the studio where Fellini made so many of
his films, is revealed through previously unseen behind-the-scenes pictures that
were taken by photographers such as Gideon Bachmann, Deborah Beer, Pierluigi
Praturlon and Paul Ronald. This publication, which was conceived as a visual
laboratory, shows how Fellini created a mythical image of himself and of Italian
life in his films and in other media, and how he constantly reinterpreted his early
years, his dreams and the images and stories conjured up by his subconscious.
We have chosen not to follow a chronological sequence, but to present
Fellini’s take on the twentieth century – the age of cinema, of course, but also that
Design Studio Claus Wiersma conceived the design for the exhibition, which is
both complex and crystal clear. The graphic design of the book and the exhibition
was in the capable hands of the designers at Joseph Plateau. They have produced
a beautiful publication with a contemporary twist.
And last but not least, our thanks go out to all the employees at EYE who
have worked on the book, the exhibition and the accompanying programme with
tremendous dedication and an infectious degree of commitment. I am convinced
that, just as Fellini’s oeuvre has inspired us and many other generations of film
lovers, this book and the exhibition will inspire a new audience and allow it to be
captivated and absorbed by the work of this unrivalled maestro of the cinema.
4
Buon divertimento!
Sandra den Hamer
Directeur EYE
Juni 2013
5
From left to right: Fellini, his assistant Moraldo Rossi, the photographers
Pierluigi Praturlon and Tazio Secchiaroli, the agent Ezio Vitale and the
photographer Sandro Vespasiani, October 1958.
6
7
After leaving his home province of
Romagna to try his luck in Rome,
Federico Fellini earned a living as a
caricaturist for satirical newspapers.
Employed successively by 420, Marc’­
Aurelio and Travaso, he worked in a
vein of schoolboy humour exploiting
the war of the sexes and the comic
effects of repetition. Caricature is an
art of distortion which only needs a
few lines to capture a situation, a pose
or a subject. With his pencil, the young
Fellini deftly conjured up a world that
was like a great parade, full of strange
faces and generously endowed
female creatures, a formula which he
would keep using through­out his long
career.
At the same time, he was starting
to write screenplays, working along­
side Roberto Rossellini (Rome, Open
City, 1945, Paisà, 1946, Europa ’51,
1952), but also Pietro Germi (In the
Name of the Law, 1948), Luigi
Comen­cini (Behind Closed Shutters,
1950) and Giorgio Pastina (Came­
riera bella presenza offresi, 1951).
In 1950, he co-wrote his first film,
Variety Lights, with Alberto Lattuada.
Not that Fellini ever gave up drawing.
As a filmmaker, he always carried
some pencils in his pocket and
expressed himself in images as much
as he did in language, using sketches
to convey the situations he wanted to
shoot to his actors and crew and,
starting in the 1960s, transcribing his
own dreams.
Caricatures,
juvenilia
Italian poster for Roberto Rossellini’s L’Amore,
screenplay co-written by Fellini, 1948.
Federico Fellini, The two comrades, Il Travaso,
27 April 1947:
“— Comrade, I just fell from the fourth floor!
— But Comrade, it’s not mentioned in L’Unità!
— Comrade, then it’s not true. We’ll meet in the
cinema. Long live Togliatti!”
Fellini and a friend, Christmas 1944.
Federico Fellini, Il Travaso, 4 May 1947
“— Anything else, sir?
— Another glass of water, please.”
Federico Fellini, 1940.
20
21
The rise of the illustrated press
spawned a new genre: the cinenovel,
the ancestor of the photo-novel. This
form enjoyed its greatest popularity
in post-war Italy, where millions of
copies were sold every week. The first
version of The White Sheik (1952),
the archetypical photo-novel, was
written by Michelangelo Antonioni
who sent a manuscript of some twenty
pages entitled Cara Ivan to the
producer Carlo Ponti, who in turn
gave Fellini and Tullio Pinelli – who
later became one of Fellini’s regular
scriptwriters – the task to write the
screenplay. But Antonioni withdrew
from the project, so Fellini was chosen
to make the film, his debut as a
director.
The White Sheik relates the adventures of Wanda and Ivan, a young
couple up from the provinces who are
honeymooning in Rome. Taking
advantage of her husband’s lack of
attention, Wanda escapes from their
packed programme and puts her time
in the capital to good use by paying a
visit to the White Sheik, the hero of
her favourite photo-novel. During this
unhoped-for encounter she learns all
about the excesses of the world of
entertainment. This film explores some
great Fellini themes such as popular
culture, as shaped by the illustrated
press and show business, religion
and its ceremonies, and provincials in
Rome.
The photo-novel
Brunella Bovo, The White Sheik, 1952.
Ernesto Almirante in the role of film director, The White Sheik.
Alberto Sordi, The White Sheik, 1952.
Alberto Sordi and Brunella Bovo, The White Sheik, 1952.
Italian poster for The White Sheik, 1952.
22
23
Cover of the photo-novel based on La Strada, 1954.
Inside spread and cover (p. 25) of the photo-novel based on Variety Lights, 1950.
24
25
Fellini had a lifelong passion for comic
strips, in which narrative is condensed
into a handful of frames. Reminis­
cences of those popular superheroes,
notably of the character Mandrake,
found their way into his films.
Created in 1934 by Lee Falk,
Mandrake, the music-hall magician,
embodies another recurring Fellini­es­
que theme: popular entertainment.
Fellini made numerous attempts to
adapt Mandrake’s incredible adven­
tures, but to no avail. In fact, it was
the print press that gave him the
chance to carry through his project.
As guest editor of the December 1972
issue of Vogue, Fellini, in collaboration
with the photographers Franco Pinna
and Tazio Secchiaroli, came up with a
photo-novel in which Marcello Mas­tro­
ianni played the role of Mandrake.
The ageing Mastroianni also made
an appearance as Mandrake in The
Interview (1987), a film constructed
in the form of a mock documentary,
but this time for the purposes of
advertising. Here, Fellini was not only
having a go at his star’s image; he
was also questioning the value of
cinema when measured by the criteria
of television.
Mandrake
the Magician
Federico Fellini as guest editor of a special issue of Vogue, photo-novel of the adventures of Mandrake,
December 1972.
26
Marcello Mastroianni as Mandrake in
the photo-novel in Vogue, 1972.
27
Whenever he was asked about his next
film, Fellini would reply: “Mastorna.”
In fact, he never managed to make
his film about this character who dis­
covers the afterlife. The doomed film
was postponed several times, before
it was permanently shelved.
Dino de Laurentiis, though, had
agreed to produce the film. At great
cost, Fellini had sets built of the
cathedral of Cologne and of a lifesize aeroplane at Dinocittà (the
producer’s studio). He eventually
managed to shoot the first scenes but
then became seriously ill and the
project was put on hold.
In the early 1990s the journalist
Vicenzo Mollica suggested that he
revive the project. The two friends
shared a passion for comics: instead
of a film, Mastorna would be a comic
book! Mollica asked Milo Manara to
get involved. This was the start of a
strange exchange between Mollica,
Fellini and Manara. Fellini drew a
version of the story in the form of a
storyboard and gave it to Mollica, who
owned one of the first fax machines
and forwarded the panels to Manara
in Northern Italy. In 1992, this process
eventually led to the publication of Il
viaggio di G. Mastorna, detto Fernet
in the maga­zine Ciak. Credited to both
Fellini and Manara, this was one of
Fellini’s last works.
The voyage
of Mastorna
Marcello Mastroianni during a screen test for Il viaggio di G. Mastorna, 1966.
Milo Manara, sketch for Il viaggio di
G. Mastorna, 1992.
Federico Fellini and Milo Manara, Il viaggio di
G. Mastorna, CIAK Racconta, 1992.
Marcello Mastroianni during a screen test for Il viaggio di G. Mastorna, 1966.
Federico Fellini and Milo Manara, Il viaggio di
G. Mastorna, CIAK Racconta, 1992.
28
Federico Fellini, sketch for Il viaggio di
G. Mastorna, 1962.
28
Whether as political symbol, attribute
of popular culture or object of mockery,
parades are found in every form in
Fellini’s work, from fascist pageants
to processions of streetwalkers or
clowns.
“We were born with three images:
the king, Il Duce and the pope,” he
used to say.1 In his films we can still
sense the ridiculous pomposity of those
fascist parades marching through the
scene at a running pace, as well as a
mixture of fascination and derision
with regard to the Church. “I love the
choreography of the Catholic Church.
I love its unchanging, hyp­notic repre­
sen­tations, its sumptuous theatre, its
lugubrious dirges, the catechism, the
election of the new pontiff, and the
grandiose mortuary procedure. The
merits of the Church are those of any
mental construction which helps protect
us against the engulfing magma of
the unconscious.”2
Ecclesiastical parade, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
Fascist parade, The White Sheik, 1952.
Parade of bikers, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
Parades
Procession of prostitutes in a brothel, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
30
30
When Fellini moved to Rome at the
age of nineteen he lived in a family
boarding house on Via Albalonga. In
the evening he used to dine in a small
trattoria, where he would observe the
gargantuan eaters of spaghetti that
are part of Italian folklore. When the
weather improved, restaurant tables
spilled out across the pavement and
into the road, becoming a colourful
meeting place. The director recreated
this typically Roman ambience in the
dinner scene of Fellini’s Roma (1972).
“Everything here belongs to the belly,
becomes belly. […] A spectacle to be
devoured with the eyes, but also the
menace of all those eyes, mouths, faces
and overflowing bodies, eager to
swallow.”3
Diners
Dinner scene, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
Dinner scene, La Domenica del Corriere, 29 May 1965.
Dinner scene, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
Fellini on the set of La Dolce Vita, 1959.
32
32
Federico Fellini on the cover of Télérama on the
occasion of the release of Fellini’s Roma, 4 June 1972.
Dinner scene in Cinecittà’s Studio 5, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
34
Fellini’s mythology often invoked the
theatre of illusion. Beauty contests,
dance halls and carnivals, those
temples to the cult of appearance,
provided regular inspiration. Circus
and music hall also appear through­
out his work, from Variety Lights
(1950) to I Clowns (1970). According
to the legend, the young Fellini was
so fascinated by travelling performers
that he ran away to follow a circus
caravan. “Immediately when I saw it I
felt traumatized, and at the same time
totally committed to that noise and
music, to those monstrous apparit­ions,
to those death-defying acts. I saw the
big top as a miracle factory where
things were done that were impossible
for most men. This kind of show, based
on wonder and fantasy, on pranks and
nonsense, and on the lack of any coldly
intellectual meaning, is just the thing
for me.”4
Giulietta Masina as Gelsomina, La Strada, 1954.
The circus
Federico Fellini and a clown, La Dolce Vita, 1960.
Richard Basehart as the tightrope walker, La Strada, 1954.
36
Clowns, 8½, 1963.
37
Richard Basehart, La Strada, 1954.
Giulietta Masina and Anthony Quinn,
La Strada, 1954.
Giulietta Masina as Gelsomina, La Strada, 1954.
Poster for La Strada, 1954.
Anthony Quinn, La Strada, 1954.
Giulietta Masina and Anthony Quinn,
La Strada, 1954.
Anthony Quinn, La Strada, 1954.
Poster for Silnice (La Strada), 1954,
design Enrico Deseta.
Giulietta Masina, La Strada, 1954.
Giulietta Masina and Anthony Quinn,
La Strada, 1954.
Giulietta Masina and Anthony Quinn,
La Strada, 1954.
Richard Basehart and Giulietta Masina,
La Strada, 1954.
Richard Basehart, La Strada, 1954.
38
39
Anthony Quinn, La Strada, 1954.
40
Alberto Sordi, I Vitelloni, 1953.
The end of carnival, I Vitelloni, 1953.
Carnival, I Vitelloni, 1953.
Marcello Mastroianni, City of Women, 1980.
42
43
But who are these weirdoes, these
living caricatures who amble through
Fellini’s films? They are the heirs to a
long tradition of grotesques, figures
out of commedia dell’arte, the
attributes of the spectacle. They make
up the world according to Fellini,
halfway between carnival and
squalor. Together, they form the great
parade of “Circus Fellini.”
Grotesques
Ginger and Fred, 1986.
Max Born, Satyricon, 1969.
Mario Romagnoli, Satyricon, 1969.
Ginger and Fred, 1986.
Satyricon, 1969.
Satyricon, 1969.
Ginger and Fred, 1986.
The large sugar dress, photo for the special
Fellini issue of Vogue, 1972.
44
from left to right
Federico Fellini, drawing, no date.
Federico Fellini, drawing, 1972.
Federico Fellini, drawing, November 1974.
Federico Fellini, drawing, July 1974.
Federico Fellini, drawing, July 1974.
Federico Fellini, drawing, no date.
Federico Fellini, drawing, February 1972.
Federico Fellini, drawing of Clemente Fracassi,
26 October 1974.
Satyricon, 1969.
Ginger and Fred, 1986.
Federico Fellini, collage and drawing over
photograph.
45
Fellini employed the same method
before each new shoot: “I send a small
advertisement to the news­papers which
says more or less: ‘Federico Fellini is
ready to meet all those people who
wish to see him.’ The following days I
meet hundreds of people. Every idiot
in Rome turns up to see me, including
the police. It’s a kind of surreal mad­
house, it creates a very stimulating
atmosphere. I look at all of them
attentively. I steal something of each
visitor’s personality. […] I may see a
thousand in order to pick two, but I
assimilate them all. It’s as if they were
saying to me, ‘Take a good look at us,
each of us is a bit of the mosaic you
are now building up’.”5
At the interview, potential extras
were asked to leave a photo. This
repertoire of weird faces forms an
astonishing collection, which Fellini
himself classified by type: Interesting
faces, Exotic men, Pretty women,
Ample women with sensual faces,
Grannies, Dancers, Ugly mugs,
Generously endowed, Whorish girls,
Naïve and droll girls, Little fag faces,
Clowns, Sophisticated, Funereal
women, etc.
This is not the world according to
Fellini, but the world as it appeared
to Fellini, the world that answered his
call – the one that, rightly or wrongly,
considered itself Felliniesque.
Photo of would-be actor sent to Fellini.
46
Casting
sessions
Casting session for Fellini’s Casanova, 1976.
Photo of would-be actor sent to Fellini.
Federico Fellini, casting session for A Director’s
Notebook, 1969.
Photos of would-­be
actors sent to Fellini.
47
Photos of would-­be actors sent to Fellini.
48
49
One evening in November 1958,
a young Roman aristocrat was cele­
brat­­ing his birthday in a fashionable
night­club, the Rugantino, which was
popular with bright young things but
also with film stars, writers and intel­
lectuals. That night, Anita Ekberg set
the joint on fire by launching into a
wild, barefoot dance. Eager to outdo
the star, Aiché Nanà, a young actress
desperate to make a name for herself,
raised the roof with a provocative
striptease.
An uproar ensued. The scene was
immortalised by Tazio Secchiaroli, one
of the first celebrity photo­graphers,
and the next morning his pictures were
on the front page of all the magazines.
Italians were outraged, and worried
by the decadence of the nation’s high
society.
As for Fellini, who at the time was
in the middle of his screenplay for La
Dolce Vita (1960), the event inspired
him to write the scene with the strip­
tease by the actress Nadia Gray.
The Rugantino
Music hall scene, Variety Lights, 1950.
Striptease scene, La Dolce Vita, 1960.
Striptease scene, La Dolce Vita, 1960.
50
51
“Turkish girl strips,” L’Espresso, 16 November 1958.
Nadia Gray’s striptease, La Dolce Vita, 1960.
52
Aiché Nanà strips at the Rugantino, November 1958.
53
In the 1950s, the American studios
were looking to cut costs. At the time,
Cinecittà, with its sophisticated infra­
structure and its cheap skilled labour
was a commercial godsend for the
big Hollywood production companies.
Over the next years, these giants of
cinema invaded the place with a trawl
of film stars, love affairs and scandals
in their wake. Rome became known
as Hollywood-on-Tiber.
This was the birth of the celebrity
press, scandal sheets that published
photos taken on the sly. The Via Veneto
became the playground of a new kind
of photographer who was always
hunting for a scoop or a snapshot of
a star. Pictures that fetched high prices
grabbed the headlines of the gutter
press. In La Dolce Vita, Fellini shows
the entertainment world and casts an
amused eye on this game of appear­
ances. The photographer in the film,
Paparazzo, played by Walter
Santesso, is modelled after Tazio
Secchiaroli, the most famous photo­
grapher at the time. Fifty years later,
La Dolce Vita is a cult film and the term
paparazzi has become a house­hold
word.
Paparazzi
Paparazzi photographing the arrival of Anita Ekberg, La Dolce Vita, 1960.
Ava Gardner on the front page of L’Espresso, 26 July 1956.
Photographers at work, L’Espresso, 17 February 1957.
Candid photos of Ava Gardner and Walter Chiari swimming, 26 August 1956.
Anouk Aimée and two photographers in the Via Veneto, La Dolce Vita, 1960.
54
55
Federico Fellini, drawing of Walter Santesso as
Paparazzo, around 1960.
Photographer with his damaged camera, 1950s.
Anita Ekberg and her husband Anthony Steel
about to give chase to a photographer,
15 August 1958.
The actor Walter Chiari chasing Tazio Secchiaroli, 1958.
Anthony Steel chasing a photographer,
15 August 1958.
Anita Ekberg greeting journalists with a bow
and arrow, 20 October 1960.
Walter Santesso, the photographer Paparazzo
in La Dolce Vita, 1960.
Tazio Secchiaroli in front of the Café de Paris,
Via Veneto, 1950s.
57
57
Sandro Simeoni, poster for La Dolce Vita, 1960.
58
59
In the 1940s, Ginger and Fred became
acclaimed music hall stars with their
imitation of the tap dancing of Ginger
Rogers and Fred Astaire. Forty years
later, forgotten by the public, they are
hauled back into the limelight by
television for a comeback, randomly
surrounded by a troupe of dwarves,
a lover of extraterrestrials and a
defrocked priest (played by photo­
grapher Jacques-Henri Lartigue).
Among this Felliniesque crowd was
an amazing host of look-alikes, as if
to say that television is merely a pale
copy, that cinema is still the original.
To recruit his extras, Fellini care­
fully organised casting sessions with
Deborah Beer, his set photo­grapher.
Among the look-alikes of celebrities
from the worlds of cinema and
literature were two Woody Allens,
a Kojak, a Marlene Dietrich and
a Brigitte Bardot. Fellini even took on
literature, with look-alikes of Marcel
Proust and Franz Kafka.
Franz Kafka, Marcel Proust and Elisabeth II,
casting for look-alikes, Ginger and Fred, 1986.
Look-alikes
Ronald Reagan, Brigitte Bardot, Bette Davis, Woody Allen 1 and Woody
Allen 2, casting for look-alikes, Ginger and Fred, 1986.
Marlene Dietrich and Kojak, casting for lookalikes, Ginger and Fred, 1986.
60
60
Bette Davis, casting for look-alikes, Ginger and Fred, 1986.
63
Anita Ekberg had caused a sensation
in La Dolce Vita. The following year,
Fellini offered Anita Ekberg a rather
unusual role in his new film, The Temptations of Doctor Antonio (1962).
Here, a giant advertising poster shows
the generously endowed actress
reclining, encouraging passers-by to
drink more milk! This billboard stands
in the middle of a vacant lot, facing
the buildings of the EUR district, built
under Mussolini. This “gross
indecency” incurs the wrath of a local
resident, the very puritanical Doctor
Antonio. Outraged at this assault on
morality, he starts up a censorship
campaign, but then the splendid
creature comes down from her poster
and starts trying to seduce him. Fellini
was once again exploring the theme
of morality ravaged by the images of
the modern world.
The Temptations of
Doctor Antonio
Peppino De Filippo as Saint George, The Temptations of Doctor Antonio (Boccaccio ’70), 1962.
Anita Ekberg on an advertisement poster,
“Drink more milk,” The Temptations of Doctor
Antonio (Boccaccio ’70), 1962.
The Temptations of Doctor Antonio (Boccaccio ’70),
1962.
Peppino De Filippo, The Temptations of Doctor
Antonio (Boccaccio ’70), 1962.
The Temptations of Doctor Antonio (Boccaccio ’70), 1962.
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Ginger and Fred (1986) is a long
diatribe against private television and
the mediocrity of its fare. “For me,
television has nothing in common with
cinema: it reduces and mortifies films.
In fact, I don’t think there’s such a thing
as a televisual style. […] Television is
a domestic appliance, incapable of
conveying images by an authentic
filmmaker.”6 Fellini even interlarded
his film with mock advertisements and
over-the-top posters.
The filmmaker targets television
and casts a critical eye on this brave
new world in which commercials
persuade us that everything is for sale.
These were the decisive years when
the Italian government started
privatising the public channels and
Silvio Berlus­coni laid the foundation
of a powerful media group. Soon the
businessman was arguing that films
on television should be broken up to
fit in com­mercials. Fellini was furious.
Mock advertisement posters, Ginger and Fred, 1986.
Mock advertise­ments
Group of young hippies, Fellini’s Roma, 1972.
Federico Fellini, sketches for a mock poster, The Voice of the Moon, 1990.
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