Fellini flix

[perezoso]

Most film buffs have seen and savored La Dolce Vita. The Messiah being hoisted by a helicopter is worth the price of admission, as is Nina Rota's absurd pop-jazz soundtrack. What about other Fellini? Satyricon is perhaps the most bizarre: a retelling of a Petronius tale from the days of the Roman Empire. It's not quite Caligula, but probably a bit too much for the average Dan and Marilyn Quayle out at the Podunk Panorama on Friday night. But for hipsters, and even aspiring hipsters (red state people) Satyricon should be witnessed: nothing like a pagan orgy to get those creative juices flowing...

Casanova is another choice Fellini spectacle sure to scare the merde out of what remains of any hick's protestant soul ; Sutherland does the great seducer excellently, though with a touch of melancholy. The fuck contest--wherein two rakes screw two whores to see who cums the most--is better than any cheap porn pulp--and again, you have to see it, preferably with someone who will be suitably outraged. And there's lots of mockery of other topics that the middle class would rather not think about. The concubine-automaton though--Casanova's dream 'bot--is nearly cyberpunk..........


Amarcord provides the yokel with a nice taste of Mussolini Italia: lots of thieves, corrupt townspeople, soldiers, and plump sexay italian girls that like it dirtay..........

[e_dog]

in what alternate universe do "hicks" and "yokels" watch Fellini films? alas.

anyway, Satyricon is truly kickass crazy and bizarre. the scene at the end (those who haven't seen it but plan to, read no further --



(it's been a while since i seen it so forgive me if my memory is inaccurate about placing the characters and the exact scenario)

where the lord has died and in his will and testament grants his estates to be divided amongst his rivals on the condition that the recipients eat his dead body raw, like necro cannibals. and of course, they --

what an awesome critique or simple disgusting presentation of greed and debasement, the ways that humans will go, for for what?

[Zlatko Waterman]

"Juliet of the Spirits", both lyrical and tart-- a little poem to Fellini's Giulietta, is a tender memory. I saw it when it was released, in 1965, in a then-outre theater in San Francisco.

http://home.earthlink.net/~copaceticcom ... irits.html

Satyricon is a masterpiece.

Fellini has also authored some interesting comix , published by CASTERMAN in France:

http://bd.casterman.com/bio/FelliniFe/?r=castaut


( in French)



Zlatko




--Z

[Arcadia]

I love Fellini and labels always makes me laugh.

[e_dog]

POLL: Who has better taste in cinematic whores -- Woody Allen or Fellini?

[perezoso]

Anita Ekburg compared to who--Diane Keaton? I tkink Signore Fellini wins that contest. Fellini whores are sexay, exotic, somewhat absurd: such as the society bimbos in La Dolce Vita that the writer figure hustles ( his own somewhat plain wife is left at home). .Amarcord features this great blubbery town slut--when she appears there is a pleasant, ironic, strange Rota melody. Fellini's sluts are sexy and absurd, yes, but as with most of his characters, there's a sense of melancholy to them, and to the milieu as a whole....

Diane Keaton, on the other hand, seems like a ditzy college dropout chick who ends up going home with the band's drummer and missing her final in, say, French 101....Mia Farrow is amusing but sort of mousy and plain. Woody's overrated. Annie Hall was OK I guess, but who really cares. Manhattan features that nice interior cinematography, but the dialogue is sort of uninteresting.....alright Broadway Danny Rose made me chuckle--Mia as a mobster moll....did you ever see that early Woody flick where he's a prisoner and tries to escape with a gun carved out of soap? he nearly makes it...but as he's got it pointed at the guard ( and it's raining) .....the gun melts.....bada bing bada boom baybe

[Zlatko Waterman]

One of Woody's (Heywood Allen Konigsberg's) best lines-- from "Annie Hall":

( to Paul Simon)


Simon: C'mon over to my place. We're just gonna get mellow . . ."

Woody: "I don't like to get mellow, because then I ripen and I rot . . ."


"Radio Days", "The Front" and "Zelig" as well as "Crimes and Misdemeanors" all have their moments.


Like Archibald Leach (Cary Grant), he can't stop parting his hair like that or smiling that peculiar smile . . .

But Mr. Koningsberg can't keep his finger off the "confessional to a psychiatrist" trigger . . .



Zlatko

[perezoso]

Yeah...heh heh....remember Woody trying a little westsiide peruvian blow? and he goes to whiff some....and sneeezes...

I did laugh at Crimes and Misdemeanors when he considers becoming religious--and goes and buys the catholic votive gear..(the Hay-Zeus whose eyes open and close like a doll?) ..speaks with hari krishnas..heh eheh hehehe

[e_dog]

to my knowledge diane keaton never played a whore in a woody allen film. mira sorvino did as have jodie foster, lily tomlin and others.

see for example, mighty aphrodite and shadows n fog.

woody allen ain't overrated, and while perhaps fellini is more skillful cinematically-poetically, not sure 'bout that, woody allen is excellent on dialogue-script.

perezoso's reply slides sinisteerly from "whore" (what i asked about) to "slut" (a rather different, and more legally legitimate if not morally, category) to, apparently, female characters in general , in talking about allen's lead women. that is pretty misogynistic, no?
(perhaps unintentional)

[perezoso]

For a hip, existential, leftist kinda dude you still have some pretty rigid, if not sentimental, bourgeois moral codes, don't ya, e-dawg....often yr writing seems a bit closer to a democrat social studies teacher than to a Sartre or Foucault......

I keep waiting for yr grand statement of objective ethics wherein you prove to us why we should not be misanthropic, misogynistic, individualists, consumers, etc. I am not so misogynistic ( except as far as misogyny falls within the category of misanthropy)...Anyways, the use of the word "whore" is pretty close to misogyny as well, demi Dawg

[e_dog]

ooh, i touched a nerve?

you accused me of everything except what i expected from you-- p.c. feminism, although maybe that's what you mean by 'social studies teacher.'

i don't find anything wrong with the word 'whore' or most any other word, rather it is the concepts expressed thereby, and when one sems to regard "whore" and "heroine" as denoting the same thing, that's quite objectionable -- that doesn't require a major defense by a moral code, either --

i am glad you are anticipating my ethical theory--let you know when the book comes out-- but actually you will be disappointed if you expect a statement of 'objective ethics' as i don't believe in ethical objectivity except in a very narrow range and hence not very interesting range of cases.

misanthropy is the night in which all cows are black, to paraphrase Hegel.

[perezoso]

No nerve touched, at least by you--there was no indication by me that I meant "whore" as synonymous to heroines or to women in general. In fact your initial statement could be more easily interpreted as implying that; there are really few "whores" OR heroines in Allen's comedy, so a reasonable inference is that you meant "trashy or slutty women."

Whatever. Shadows and Fog does have that weird brothel scene but Allen's films--and his actresses--are quite tame in comparison to FF's.

As far as "objective ethics"--I agree it's sort of dull and pedestrian to discuss-- but many on the left (of course clueless fundies do too) often--too often--simply assume they do exist, or that they are self-evident. Sartre was mostly correct in his statement that most human relationships can be viewed as either sadistic or masochistic power interactions, but I view those relations more from a behaviorist and biological POV. War itself is not so far from a group of river monkeys battling with the plains monkeys for food or for breeding rights.....

so are ya a "provider" or not, e-dog? alpha-dog or beta-pup? unfortunately, I think a few too many continental philosophy courses have put you in the beta-pup category man...e-pup!

[e_dog]

a few too many continental philosophy courses have put you in the beta-pup category man

quoth the guy who uses "Kierkegaardian" as an adjective.

anyways,

there is no return to the state o nature, not for dogs, not for man either.
the human is a thoroughly domesticated AND technologized species which means we can shift the river or dam it up or destroy ourselves. monkeys have no nukes. or law.

the maxim describing the linguistic behaviour of some orators: when you don't have anything rationally compelling to say, try to personally insult your interlocutor. fight like a beast, but one in chains.

but one should not strive to be the alpha-male or any pre-encoded, delineated role; instead, to be the uber-mensh . . .

[perezoso]

Did I say anything about returning to a state of nature? You are in a state of nature. You require food, shelter, and a mate--(that might be difficult though) . Employment, politics, laws, even technology exist to help facilitate humans achieve their more primal needs--and the uglier sides of a state of "nature"-territoriality, dominance, rivalries-- still exist at human level ...
I never denied the technological--far from it, since I approve of benevolent uses of technology-- but it's being wielded in many cases by people with little more "rationality" than primates