Fellini 100
Screening Dates
  • July 29, 2021 6:15
  • August 3, 2021 8:20
New Restoration

“A fitting valedictory … A highly ornamented, surreal valentine to a life in the movies.”

Johanna Steinmetz, Chicago Tribune

Fellini’s penultimate movie, a freewheeling summation of the director’s career in pseudo-documentary form, was made to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Cinecittà, the renowned Italian film studio. The intervista (interview) of the title is conducted by a Japanese TV crew, in Rome to film Fellini preparing a new production (an adaptation, supposedly, of Kafka’s America). Fellini guides his guests on a delightful, fantasy-filled trip down memory lane — and through the hallowed halls of the giant Cinecittà complex, where so many of Fellini’s phantasmagoric inventions were achieved. Memories spring to life in marvellous period reconstructions; Marcello Mastroianni makes a Mandrake the Magician-like appearance; and, in the film’s charming centrepiece, Mastroianni reunites with Anita Ekberg for a tear-jerking reprise of La Dolce Vita​’s famous Trevi Fountain scene. The musical score, by Nicola Piovani, pays tribute to the late Nino Rota.

“An unequivocal delight … A magical mixture of recollection, parody, memoir, satire, self-examination, and joyous fantasy.”

Vincent Canby, New York Times
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