The storyline itself is very simple. A famous director is preparing a new film, but finds himself suffering from creative block: he is obsessed by, loves, and feels unending frustration with both art and women, and his attention and ambition flies in so many different directions that he is suddenly incapable of focusing on one possibility lest he negate all others. With deadlines approaching the cast and crew descend upon him demanding information about the film-information that the director does not have because he finds himself incapable of making an artistic choice.

What makes the film interesting is the way in which Fellini ultimately transforms the film as a whole into a commentary on the nature of creativity, art, mid-life crisis, and the battle of the sexes. Throughout the film, the director dreams dreams, has fantasies, and recalls his childhood-and this internal life is presented on the screen with the same sense of reality as reality itself. The staging of the various shots is unique; one is seldom aware that the characters have slipped into a dream, fantasy, or memory until one is well into the scene, and as the film progresses the lines between external life and internal thought become increasingly blurred, with Fellini giving as much (if not more) importance to fantasy as to fact.

The performances and the cinematography are key to the film's success. Even when the film becomes surrealistic, fantastic, the actors perform very realistically and the cinematography presents the scene in keeping with what we understand to be the reality of the characters lives and relationships. At the same time, however, the film has a remarkably poetic quality, a visual fluidity and beauty that transforms even the most ordinary events into something slightly tinged by a dream-like quality. Marcello Mastroianni offers a his greatest performance here, a delicate mixture of desperation and ennui, and he is exceptionally well supported by a cast that includes Claudia Cardinale, Anouk Aimee, and a host of other notables.

I would encourage people not to be intimidated by the film's reputation, for its content can be quickly grasped, and when critics state the film requires repeated viewing what they actually seem to mean is that the film holds up extremely well to repeated viewing; each time it is seen, one finds more and more to enjoy and to contemplate. Even so, I would be amiss if I did not point out that people who prefer a cinema of tidy plot lines and who dislike ambiguity or the necessity of interpreting content will probably dislike 8 a great deal; if you are uncertain in your taste on these points you would do well to rent or borrow the film before making a purchase. For all others: strongly, strongly recommended.


Fellini's masterpiece--what else could it be?   January 11, 2003
 29 out of 36 found this review helpful

Semi-autobiographical self-analysis mixed with fantasies in a movie? It worked for Fellini to the point that it yielded him his third Oscar for best foreign film, the other two being La Strada and La Dolce Vita. It's a unique testament to his vision.

The opening scene itself is memorable. In it, Guido Anselmi is inside a car surrounded by traffic. He tries to get out but can't, frantically rapping on the window, unable to breathe. The occupants of the other cars stare expressionlessly at him. It's a brilliant symbol of the oppression of society and conformity. The allegory continues with him soaring into the sky and being a human kite, after which authority orders him to be brought back down to earth instead of being in the clouds. How repressive!

Guido is a film director in his stride who's onto a rough start with his current project. Yet his collaborator Daumier finds several flaws. There is no fundamental guiding principle, no philosophical premise, and ambiguous intention. One thing that Guido wants for sure is an angelic woman dressed in white, symbolizing innocence, purity, and salvation. Ironically, in the end, it is she identifies his problem for him. The reason why there isn't a coherent project going on is that the movie is more scenes from Guido's childhood, and many of those are played throughout the film. He wants to make a film that is honest, helpful to everyone, and that will bury everything dead in everyone. But does he really have anything to say? In the meantime, he is hounded by his producer to stick to schedule, hire actors, and start shooting.

He also has a mistress Carla, who's extravagant, sexy, a bit loquacious, being at an impasse in his marriage to Luisa. But it's the fantasy-world and the past that he retreats to in times of stress that's the real wonder here. We learn of his encounter with the hefty and sensuous Saraghina, who lives on the beach and who teaches the local Catholic school kids forbidden dances. The scene of having his own harem, full of the women whom he has encountered, is nothing more than a big booster shot to his male ego. I need to daydream something like that more often.

In the scene between Guido and the Catholic cardinal, I found a line there that reminded me why I quit going to church. Guido complains of not being happy. The cardinal replies, "Why should you be happy? That is not your task in life. Who said we were put on Earth to be happy?" He then quotes from Origenes: "There is no salvation outside the Church."

A question from Guido to Claudia, the stunning actress tapped to play his pure angel is also one to us all: "Could you choose one single thing and be faithful to it? Could you make it the one thing that gives your life meaning, just because you believe in it?"

Marcello Mastroianni is well-placed as Guido, as is Sandra Milo as Carla and Anouk Aimee as Luisa. Barbara Steele plays someone usually out-of-character compared to the horror films she did during this time, as Gloria, the poetic young fiancee of Guido's friend Mario. She has a wonderful line: "The cruel bees have sucked the life from these poor flowers."

This movie was called 8-1/2 because Fellini had done seven films plus three collaborations in which he shot a short segment for an anthology, counting each collaboration as half, so he decided this film would be his 8-1/2th. One of those movies in a league by itself.


Perchance to dream...   December 6, 2001
 23 out of 26 found this review helpful

The most obvious achievement in 8 1/2, Fellini's mind-boggling piece of self-examination, is its audacious mixture of dreams and reality in order to show the protagonist Guido's whimsical mind state. Dream sequences come and go without warning, depicting Guido's pain, yearning, frustration, guilt that can pop up at any instant. The first time we see Guido's face, it is his mirror image, hinting to us the unreality we are about to face. Some of the dream sequences have a Bunuel-like surrealism. Some of them, however, blend almost seamlessly into scenes of reality, intentionally confounding us. Some are nightmarish, yet some are warm and hopeful. Some are brief flights of fancy, and some are lengthy, elaborate, wild visions that reflect Guido's heightened sense of confusion and anxiety. Although the film is often called the best film ever made about a filmmaker, its theme is universal in that it is a vivid picturization of a person's (and by extension, any person's) mind, which is often haunted by the past, tormented by the present, and apprehensive about the future and the unknown...

The new Criterion DVD of 8 1/2 has a sparkling video transfer. A frame-by-frame cleanup of the picture has been done, so this DVD is significantly better-looking than Criterion's laserdisc version in 1989. There are momentary freeze frames during the opening scene, but since they also appeared on the LD, I assume they are normal. The 1.0 mono audio track is indistinguishable in quality from that on the LD -- it is mostly clean and sharp, although loud sound shows some distortion. The image is anamorphic. The disc is region-free. The audio is supported by newly-translated optional English subtitles.

There is one slight discrepancy between the LD and the DVD. The LD contained the American release version of the film in which some scenes, such as the one in which Guido first meets his wife, had altered music cues. The DVD, however, is the original Italian version, retaining all of its original music.

The DVD's audio commentary comprises of scene-specific comments (whose authorship is unclear), and additional comments from critic Gideon Bachmann and NYU professor Antonio Monda. The result is a pretty well-rounded audio essay covering the film's conception, production details, themes, and artistic significance, as well as personal recollections, anecdotes, and abandoned concepts and scenes. Other extras include two 1-hour films on the filmmakers. The first is "Fellini: A Director's Notebook", directed by and starring Fellini himself. It is a sort of Fellini-style DAY FOR NIGHT, a fictional, somewhat humorous account of how the director goes about making a film. The video/audio quality of this piece is poor, and there are no subtitles or closed captioning. The second film is a documentary made by German filmmakers in 1993 titled "Nino Rota: Between Cinema and Concert". It offers an intimate yet enigmatic portrayal of Nino Rota through his personal recordings, film footage of him working with Fellini, clips of some early films scored by Rota, and interviews of his associates and students. One segment is about how Rota recycled his score from the 1957 film FORTUNELLA to create the theme for THE GODFATHER, an act that would cost him the Oscar nomination. The DVD extras also include 3 new interviews. Sandra Milo speaks candidly about her experiences, both personal and professional, with Fellini. Linda Wertmuller lavishes praises on Fellini's genius while offering a fascinating appraisal of Fellini's psychology that figures prominently in 8 1/2. And Vittorio Storaro pays tributes to the achievements of 8 1/2's cinematographer, Gianni di Venanzo. Rounding out the extras are 100 or so still photos from the set of the film, some of which were taken from deleted scenes.


What a Director Dreams of a Masterpiece   October 5, 1999
 22 out of 25 found this review helpful

Federico Fellini masterpiece hasn't faded a bit but is as sweeping and lush as it was in the early 60s. Commonly seen as an autobiographical effort, it is more a self-commentary on his own style of filmmaking. Fellini loves caricatures and he clearly paints his women Anouk Aimee as the plain unhappy wife, Sandra Milo as the voluptuous shallow girlfriend, Edra Gale as the monstrous Saraghina, and Claudia Cardinale as the ideal dream girl -- not unlike Dante Aligheri's Beatrice. As a finale, he gathers all he knows into one big circus ring, another caricature on life's meaning. Or take the childhood phrase "asa nisi masa" which refers to the feminine soul (anima). Many of his characters appear almost as clowns/caricatures. Guido, like Fellini, does not work from a script, but looks to the changing relationship between his characters as his inspiration for the development of the script and plot. Hence, Guido (Marcello Mastroianni) receives constant criticism and pressure from past figures (priests and his father) and his film colleagues and producers. Only when he actually meets his star (Claudia Cardinale) does idealism turn to realism as the dream girl becomes a material person who tell Guido that he is a "cheat" since he has no script and part for her. Fellini is such a master of the the dream sequences from which he moves so smoothly and effortlessly to reality. Only after being told there is no role (for Claudia) does Guido begin to face reality. This last scene actually approaches the Fellini-Cardinale relationship during shooting. When one realizes this parallel between filmmaking and personal life, it is not surprising that Fellini chooses his wife, Guilietta Masini, (although not in this film) to often be his leading lady. With this film, Fellini moved from neorealism to introspective fantasy which becomes highly apparent in his later films "City of Women," "Satyricon," etc. Finally, I feel that his earlier films up to and including "8 1/2" are much better than his later self-indulgent fantasy films.


The Opposition   May 4, 1999
 15 out of 35 found this review helpful

Yes, this film was revolutionary and, yes, it influenced a lot of directors, but I have to wonder sometimes at Fellini's sensibility. At least he gives the characters an inkling of depth in this movie, as opposed to the parodically-flat characterization of Amarcord or Satyricon. But this is still a world peopled by Fellini-types: shallow, self-absorbed, and unenlightened. No one can ever accuse Fellini of having a PHILOSOPHY. And the protagonist's flights of fancy, which seem opaque the first time you watch them, unravel into mindlessly obvious metaphors upon a second viewing. Again, yes, his reality is insufferably shallow and, yes, he wants to retreat into his imagination. But, after you understand that, is there really anything else there? I think a lot of people are so taken with the idea of an art film that's watchable--and it IS watchable, what with the pretty girls and all--that they fail to see that Fellini is mostly smoke and mirrors, a fact that becomes painfully obvious with his later work. Fellini DID rid the world of Italian Neo-Realism, which was drying up by the time 8 1/2 was released, but he didn't put anything substantive in its place. All of this would be forgivable if his images were well-conceived...but with the exception of the opening sequence (which is godawfully good), he's not much of a cinematographer either. Enough Fellini worship.