Federico Fellini
Federico
Fellini
and Giulietta Masina
Federico Fellini was born in Rimini in 1920, the year in which Walt
Disney made his first cartoon. Cartoons and comic strips were the great
passions of Fellini's youth. He debuted in Rome as a creator of comic strips
and vignettes for magazines of the time. During a radio transmission he
met actress Giulietta Masina and married her soon thereafter. It was the
encounter of his life; together they wrote several of the most important
pages in Italian cinema.
Federico
Fellini
In the '40s he worked alongside directors like Rossellini and Germi. In this way he began a fantastic adventure marked by international recognition and five Academy awards. For half a century Fellini would tell audiences of the world, through film, his dreams, his fantastic obsessions. For his inimitable style, an adjective would be coined; anything that is a mysterious dream, an extraordinary, unusual and bizarre fantasy, is defined today as "Felliniesque". Federico Fellini died on October 31, 1993; his lifelong companion, Giulietta, followed him a few months later.
Federico Fellini - His Work
Scene
from 'I Vitelloni'
Fellini released his first film, Luci del variet� in 1950. Lo
sceicco bianco in 1952 on the world of the fotoromanzo (soap operas
in print), was a failure. I Vitelloni, an autobiographical portrayal
of youths from provincial Italy, suspended between dreams of glory and
the inability to act, on the other hand, met a different fate, winning
an award at the Festival di Venezia.
Giulietta
Masina in 'La Strada'
Success arrived with La strada, 1956 Oscar-winner, that gave
the world the moving character of Gelsomina, sweet and defenseless in the
face of life's cruelty, as acted by an extraordinary Giulietta Masina.
His next films were Il bidone, on the world of penniless swindlers,
and Le notti di Cabiria, another Oscar and further acclaim for Masina
in the role of the prostitute who dreams of a better life. With La
dolce vita and Otto
e mezzo (8 1/2), Fellini began his long association with Marcello
Mastroianni, the "Fellinian" actor par excellence.
Le
Notti di Cabiria
It was 1963; having won the Oscar for Otto
e mezzo, Fellini was already one of the greats of world cinema.
Religious superstition, the mystery of the great beyond and death, nostalgia
for the provincial world, the obsession for women, the circus: these themes
most dear to Fellini unwind in the following films: Giulietta degli
spiriti in 1965, Satyricon in 1969, I clowns, Roma,
Amarcord, a 1975 Oscar-winner, Casanova, Prova d'orchesta,
La citt� delle donne in 1980.
Fellini
and Masina
with Academy Awards
And further the visionary E la nave va, Ginger and Fred in 1985, L'intervista in 1987, and finally La voce della luna, 1990, the story of a young man obssessed by the moon and by distant voices of the dead that he believes to hear emanating from wells scattered throughout the countryside, a poetic film that closed a fantastic career.
