8½
Directed by
A picture that goes beyond what men think about—because no man ever thought about it in quite this way!
Guido Anselmi, a film director, finds himself creatively barren at the peak of his career. Urged by his doctors to rest, Anselmi heads for a luxurious resort, but a sorry group gathers—his producer, staff, actors, wife, mistress, and relatives—each one begging him to get on with the show. In retreat from their dependency, he fantasizes about past women and dreams of his childhood.
| Released | 14 Feb 1963 |
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| Genres | Drama |
| Runtime | 2 hours, 19 minutes |
| Countries | France, Italy |
Liked by
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Because there is everything that somebody can decide from the mood.
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Easily the best film about the joys and desperations of film-making.
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And then there’s Fellini, who is a tremendous inspiration. I like La Strada and 8½—but really all of them and, again, for the world and the characters and the mood, and for this level, which you can’t put your finger on, that comes out in each one.
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What would Fellini do after La dolce vita? We all wondered. How would he top himself? Would he even want to top himself? Would he shift gears? Finally, he did something that no one could have anticipated at the time. He took his own artistic and life situation—that of a filmmaker who had eight and a half films to his name […] 8½ has always been a touchstone for me, in so many ways—the freedom, the sense of invention, the underlying rigor and the deep core of longing, the bewitching, physical pull of the camera movements and the compositions (another great black-and-white film: every image gleams like a pearl—again, shot by Gianni Di Venanzo). But it also offers an uncanny portrait of being the artist of the moment, trying to tune out all the pressure and the criticism and the adulation and the requests and the advice, and find the space and the calm to simply listen to oneself.
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That film has inspired and gave courage to all filmmakers to be brave enough to be able to talk about our own psyche and subconscious and fears. Fellini really taught all of us that alchemy of putting the camera inside and look inward, and then, going out and making that dream. Like, the greatest novels ever are out of fiction, and how they look in, and then, they bring that in fictional way. That’s the best literature you’ll ever read. And I think Fellini showed us the way for filmmakers.
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I could include any number of Fellini’s films, especially La strada, La dolce vita, I vitelloni, and Amarcord. But 8½ is his most perfect while also being his most freewheeling and untethered. I watch this film before I make anything. It’s so alive! Even though it’s about a director experiencing a directorial version of writer’s block, it’s so inspired. There’s so much Fellini wants to jam in there. Everything is in there: his love of women, his love of the eccentric, his idea of life as a circus.
