Hungary, 1953, during the Stalinian purges.
A woman is waiting for the very hypothetical release of her husband, in prison for political reasons. Unemployed, on the verge on poverty, she takes care of her mother-in-law.
She is regularly harassed by policemen or party members. But she endures, keeps going, keeps caring tenderly. Little is said.
How can you express waiting, longing, tenderness, hope? This is where great acting and directing takes place.
For this is a movie about love as an impetus of life and resistance, love as a politically deviant behaviour. It is also a movie about hope as a force of imagination. This woman and her mother-in-law, without speaking, imagine their life with the missing son/husband. A movie, made of memories and expectations, unfolds in their mind and we can actually understand and see this. Creation also offers a power of resistance. The end of the film, almost wordless in an intense moment of emotion.
The photography is totally stunning.
lezard's Reviews
Displaying Review 11 - 15 of 52 in total
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Why should one watch 8 ½ ? For the sake of Fellini, of Marcello Mastroianni. For the sake of cinema.
Because, the more you watch it, the better it gets.
Because, the youngest movie buffs will discover here something they will never see again : cinema as an art apart, with a unique vision, with a budget that no producer will ever give to any director again for this kind of movie.
What Fellini accomplishes here, he couldn't have written, composed or painted it. Indeed, most films can be seen as novels, plays, comics, musicals, operas and they often are adaptations. 8 ½ couldn't be anything else but a movie where photography, music, editing, acting have their own peculiar language. Very few directors have managed to do such a thing. Maybe Welles, Murnau, Tarkovski, a few others.
After 5 minutes, in 90% of all the movies, you know who's is going to win, to die, to survive, to love. What is at stake ? The hero has to lead an investigation, fulfill a vengeance, save the planet/country/community, kill the Beast, seduce the Beauty. Always.
None of all this in 8 ½. What is at stake ? Making a movie. Period.
From the very beginning Fellini takes us by the hand and leads us in a strange country : his brain.
The dream scene which opens the movie brings down the whole Hollywood industry of the last 30 years to what it is : a video game, most of the time very ugly. Whoever has dreamt one day knows, watching Inception (this is just an exemple), that this has NOTHING to do with dreams or even nightmares. It's a game where you have to win to change levels.
8 ½ is a constant surprise and wonder. Memories, life, dream, imagination, fantasies mix to create a maelstrom of pictures, feelings and emotions.
Eventually, a child, alone on a stage, in a halo of light, puts an end to this fantastic parade.
Curtain !
Bravo !
Ciao Federico !
I miss you terribly. -
What was New York really like in the 50's ? And Brooklyn ? To know this, we can try to find articles from Life, read a few novels or see the photos of Vivian Maier and Saul Leiter. Or more easily, we can watch the Little Fugitive.
Self-financed with very little money this movie could well not ever have been shot. Fortunately, it was.
With a very thin plot, the movie allows us to witness a week-end in New York, in Coney Island, more precisely. We drift among daily life, ordinary people, details, and it's fascinating.The quality of the photography is exceptional.
Moreover, this movie stands at equal distance from the Italian neo-realism and the French New Wave. It is a unique landmark in The American cinema of the 50's.
Cinema is full of fugitives and runaways. This one is funny, innocent, unexpected. Let's follow him ! -
R. Fleischer, a.k.a efficiency in film directing. Regarded as a gifted crafstman rather than a real « auteur » Fleischer is a real « product » of the studio system of the golden age of Hollywood. He has shot all genres of movies. His « films noirs » are especially quick, inventive, efficient.
Among these ones, Violent saturday is often underestimated if not totally forgotten. It's a pity because it's a jewel.
The movie, like the stick-up, is a well-built and precise piece of machinery. In 90 minutes, Fleischer's savoir-faire draws a portrait of small-town America, with a variety of characters, from the banker to the Amish farmer or the forgotten housewife. Ambitions, jaleousy, untold love are all depicted with a great simplicity. It is clear, direct.
Moreover, it stars Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine for instance. Could you ask for more ?
The violence of the heist echoes the violence of feelings, whether they be love or hatred.
A great movie, which should make one want to see Fleischer's other masterpieces, such as the Boston Strangler or the New centurions. -
First of all, it's a bit challenging to speak about the movie to people who haven't seen it, but as Chris Marker said : « Do those who haven't seen Vertigo deserve to be spoken to ? »
Let's try anyway.
Scottie, a former cop, has just resigned because he suffers from a fear of heights. He is hired by an old friend of his to follow his wife, Madeleine, who suffers from a morbid melancholia.
But you don't follow a woman like Kim Novak innocently. When she falls in San Francisco bay, he falls in love with her (People fall a lot in the movie, it's a movie about falling). He takes her home. He lives not far from the Coit tower, can you believe it ?
Spoiler :
Madeleine thinks she is possessed by the soul of a doomed woman named Carlotta. Eventually she is going to die, by falling.
Scottie is devastated, both because he is in love, but also because he failed to stop her.
He falls (again) into a deep nervous breakdown.
When he begins to recover, he accidently meets Juddy, who looks a bit like Madeleine. Driven by an insane obsession, he tries to change Juddy into Madeleine in every possible little detail. (Hitchcock, mourning the loss of Grace Kelly, and transforming Kim Novak?)
I won't reveal the end.
This could be just another Hitchcock movie, with suspense, love, lust, violence and a final switch. Still, this one is unique. There is a weird magic, a strange alchemy in this movie. Most of its charm and fascination come from the fact that it is divided into two parts which echo each other. It's a mirror-film in which everything is reversed. And it's litterally vertiginous ! For instance, see what side Madeleine is looking at when she kisses Scottie in the mission, and which side Juddy is looking at later. See how many times Scottie and Juddy are in front of a mirror, thus creating four characters. Some lines of the dialogue are even inverted. There is something really maniac about the movie, like Scottie knowing to the smallest detail of what Madeleine was wearing. Who could do this with the beloved one ?
The colors also play an important and significant part in the movie. Try to spot red and green. Who wears them ? When ? What objects, car, door, are green or red?
Finally, no matter how many times we watch the movie, the puzzle is always incomplete and the magic is still present.
To conclude, in the west, there is a place called Scotty's castle. It is a remote, forsaken place, far from everything. As a coincidence, it is located in Death Valley, the place where Scottie wanders for ever, looking for Madeleine. A beautiful coincidence ?
