Fellini racconta: Diario di un film (1983) - full transcript
WE APOLOGIZE TO THE AUDIENCE
FOR THE QUALITY OF SOME IMAGES
TAKEN FROM CUT OR UNRELEASED MATERIAL
DUE TO DEFECTS IN THE ORIGINAL VIDEOS
I remember that the first signs
of the film
came from a small piece of news
that had struck me,
regarding the funeral of a famous singer.
She had asked to be cremated,
and had left instructions in her will
concerning the ritual
to scatter her ashes.
This news had captured my attention.
We spoke about it with Tonino Guerra,
and after starting off on a labyrinthine,
chaotic path,
we gradually managed
to bring the story into focus.
The script took a very short time
to write, just a couple of weeks.
How was your relationship
with Tonino Guerra?
Excellent. We're on the same page.
I had already made Amarcord with him.
We've known each other for 40 years.
We work together
in a very complementary and free way.
There are no problems.
I've mostly had good relationships
with writers.
- First of all because...
- He's from your area.
No, besides Tonino,
I meant more in general:
With Flaiano, Pinelli,
Bernardino Zapponi, Brunello Rondi.
- I've always had very-
- Is it also a relationship of complicity?
Yes, our complicity comes
from allowing ourselves to be plunged,
consciously or maybe not,
into a vaguely Vitelloni-like
after-school atmosphere.
Like having to do homework.
We tackle things with a rather boorish
and shrewd attitude,
just trying to get them done,
one way or another.
This vague atmosphere, which I find
to be nurturing and not inappropriate,
is what turns the relationship
into a form of playful friendship.
Therefore,
working is no longer just a job.
I never manage to build
a definitive screenplay.
This is also because, having worked
for many years as a screenwriter,
and having written many scripts
before becoming a director,
I have the ambition and presumption
of being able to fix things on the spot,
even if I start production on a film
without having a fully defined script.
There comes a time in which I need
to start looking the film in its face.
FELLINI RACCONTA 2 - DIARY OF A FILM
AND THE SHIP SAILS ON
FELLINI TO STARBOARD
The anticipated announcement
came unexpected in Cinecittà's Stage 5,
this time Fellini and his ship
are hoisting the anchors.
...a certain relevance
on a personal level too.
I'm getting on in years.
I've turned 60, so -.
- Is today the 13th?
- Yes.
Great! Everything is following
the most catastrophic signs!
No less than seven sets will be used
to reconstruct the famous ship.
The huge boilers of the engine room
are almost full-scale.
Powerful pneumatic hammers
support a large platform
where the central hall
of the ship is built:
Thanks to an electronic device,
these hammers will help simulate
the oscillation and rolling
of the steamship on the waves.
None of the characters who populate
the ship will be played by famous actors.
There's a specific reason for this.
None of them are celebrities.
I made this choice deliberately.
As the film tells a story
which supposedly took place
more than one hundred years ago,
I thought that, since it's the story
of people who have disappeared,
on whom we have no more information,
since they've all turned to dust,
unknown faces could increase
a sense of curiosity
and return these characters
to their dimension as unknown people
who have vanished.
The story emerges slowly.
Finally,
Fellini explains the sense of the film.
"Today," says the director,
"we live in a world of hyper-information,
and this world conditions us."
I think the heart of the film,
the sense of the film refers
to the need to subconsciously desire
a piece of news
concerning an event so...
immense and devastating,
that we can hope for it to provoke
some kind of reaction within us.
Naturally, the film doesn't have
such an apocalyptic tone.
It's a very funny, comical
and adventurous story.
I also hope it will be fun
for the audience,
even if its heart aims
to expose a theme
that I think concerns us all.
We start in two days' time,
in an outdoor set,
built in a space in the Tiburtino area...
where we will try to recreate
the Port of Naples
from one hundred years ago.
Out of the shot! Clear the area.
Come on. Action!
The long delay
in beginning work on this film
is due to the fact
that Italian cinema in general
is going through quite a dramatic
and deep crisis.
Therefore, this project was also affected
by the delays...
stagnation and resistances of a situation
that involves cinema as a whole,
not this film in particular.
I am the glorious victim
of myths and legends
for which I thank my friends in the press.
I mean that sincerely, without irony.
Some claim that I don't talk
about the film
because I don't know what I'm making.
On the contrary, Fellini is well aware
of what he wants to do.
However, he's usually very mysterious.
Why is that?
My tendency to resist revealing
or talking about my films
isn't the result of vanity
or a desire to provoke despair
in my friends, the journalists.
It isn't skillfully designed
to create a feeling of curiosity
or suspense about the film.
It's a resistance related
to very profound reasons.
I feel as if I'm invited to gossip,
to snitch
and provide information
about something I don't yet fully know,
something that has every right to remain
in a more private and intimate dimension.
It makes me feel indiscreet.
Come forward.
Smile.
Move away.
Come forward.
Smile, they're taking your photograph!
Put your hands on your hips.
Smile. Look backwards.
Look here again. Smile.
Now go very slowly.
Look straight ahead. Smile with joy.
Go on, take him away.
No. You're giving away that he's coming.
You shouldn't.
- When I feel him grab me.
- No, later!
You shouldn't look when he comes near.
You should be smiling!
- Alberto, come here!
- It's Attilio!
Did you do a good job?
This is how you must grab him, okay?
You don't like talking about the story
before the film is released...
I'm unable to do so faithfully.
The relationship between creator
and creation is very secret and intimate.
- And fragile. Delicate.
- Yes, fragile. Delicate.
It's constantly placed in doubt,
repudiated.
It can suddenly turn dim and disappear.
One morning, you feel that your film
won't greet you. It turns its back on you.
On other mornings, it meets you festively.
What does "telling a story" mean?
A story is nothing. It's merely a story.
It's revealing the feelings
behind the story that embarrasses me.
It makes me feel embarrassed,
but also totally reluctant and resistant.
Therefore,
I prefer to make up another story.
I often do this with my friends
in the press.
But then I feel bitter, because I realize
that the story I made up
is better than the one I'm working on.
Pull it up!
Careful with the tubes. Okay.
- Action, Vittorio!
- No, no! Wait a moment!
Look over here. Smile.
Raise your head as soon
as you put your hand on the ship's wheel.
I've brought a camp kitchen.
I must say that,
of all the stages a film goes through
before its actual production,
casting is the most torturous,
despite being the most fascinating:
In the end, a face must carry the sense,
the message, the story.
In this film, more than others,
the need to choose with extreme precision
was particularly present:
You see a series of faces,
and you give each of them -.
Your imagination assigns them a story,
situations, feelings, tics,
without actually knowing if they're exact.
This film aims to restore in the viewer
the mysterious and ineffable charm
transmitted by photography.
If you browse through a photo album
of people you don't know,
especially if they are dead people,
from the previous century,
you're immediately pervaded,
attracted by interest
in stories that you don't know,
but are hinted at by the face,
the attire, the attitude.
Going back to these characters,
the cast includes some members,
like Peter Cellier and Barbara Jefford,
who are excellent English theater actors,
highly experienced and capable
of going from Shakespeare to...
- To Fellini.
- ...to Fellini!
Other cast members aren't actors at all.
They're people you found in Naples.
What issues do you face
when working simultaneously
with great professionals
and people who can barely mutter a word?
I must confess I've never had issues
with actors.
If a character has been chosen
according to what a face expresses,
and that's the face of an actor,
that's good,
as we can enjoy a professional
relationship and understanding.
Sometimes, it's also easier to explain
the needs of a character to an actor.
If it's not an actor,
but just the character,
perhaps, in a certain way,
that's even better:
He'll move with his own autonomy
and spontaneity.
Therefore, I leave that margin...
for spontaneous expression
which I believe is the essential condition
for characters, initially conceived
on a cold page of the script,
to rediscover the personal
and unpredictable elements
each human being bears within itself,
making it a unique and unrepeatable type.
I deeply admire actors.
Ever since I was a child,
I envisioned actors as semi-divine beings.
The first time I understood
what actors were,
I thought they lived
in the magical dimension
beyond the theater curtain:
In those lights, environments,
strange gardens,
or living rooms, or mansions.
I also thought they remained dressed up
even after the show.
I can explain this fantasy
with the fact that I was six or seven.
Maybe even younger.
I thought their faces
were of different colors,
their eyes were longer
and their eyebrows were blacker.
They had curls and wigs,
and extraordinary voices:
I thought they were supernatural beings,
to the extent that I identified them
with their character.
And this still conditions me.
So I think that in the evening,
after shooting,
they're still the character.
Or maybe their life stops,
and they're deposited like worn clothes
in a hotel room wardrobe,
ready for collection the next day,
when production vehicles
will take them to the theater
and they'll be returned to life
as the spotlights are lit.
Scene 34/13, first take!
Slowly look at the hand, Fiorenzo. Smile.
Take it.
Fiorenzo, slowly lower your head
while smiling.
Lower your head, and smile.
Look at the hand, Fiorenzo.
Smile. Take it.
Good, that's it.
That's good.
This film attempts
an apparently anti-cinematic operation:
To avoid the pre-fabricated novel,
a story planned beforehand.
Preparing an original script
is naturally indispensable,
not just to gain a clear view
of the story you want to tell,
but also for organizational matters.
You're well aware that materializing
that which inhabits
the foggy and chaotic sphere
of imagination,
is an advanced mathematical operation.
It requires absolute precision.
It's like sending a missile into orbit.
Not that I'm trying to cast
a legendary and romantic halo
on the working of creativity.
Careful over here! Spray the walls!
Go on! Slightly less!
Go! Be careful over there!
Ready? Go!
No more smoke!
No more smoke!
Now focus on the water!
Go with flames over there!
Up front, here!
We need to prepare it
a second before shooting!
In the end, for this film,
I chose to use well-known music:
The music of great classical composers,
and opera in particular.
The film features music by Verdi, Rossini,
Tchaikovsky, Bellini, Schubert.
In my total ignorance of musical matters,
I went searching for the striking
and indestructible emotions,
whether seductive or saddening,
I have received from music
over the course of my life.
So this film features
all the musical pieces
I listened to as a defenseless child,
an adolescent, and later on in life.
Camera!
Serious faces, okay?
Can you hear me? When I say "Action!"
You count one, two, three,
and then you look down.
And keep smiling.
Scene 29/24, first take!
Sea movement. Playback.
Go with the ship!
Motion!
Sea motion. Stop there.
During these long months of preparation,
I enjoyed the possibility of discovering
something a viewer of the film
may not imagine:
The immense work that you...
I don't know if other directors do this,
but you work on every tiny detail
composing the picture of your film.
I believe, perhaps a little emphatically,
that cinema is an art that shares
the same needs as other arts.
You'd never tell a writer, "I'm surprised
you insert the adjectives yourself,
the adverbs, the apostrophes,
the full stops."
You're not letting the editor
or typographer -.
As if these things could be left
to others!
You wouldn't ask a painter if he added
the green parts of a painting himself.
For example, I saw that when you needed
some armchairs for a scene,
you asked for one armchair
in particular to be remade many times.
Each time, you found it too small
or that its backrest was too low.
Of course. Cinema,
differently than writing or painting,
has a need for greater realism,
because the characters move and speak.
In cinema, a gunshot
is an actual detonation.
It makes you jump.
If you write,
"The gun fired. A shot was heard,"
the reader will hear the shot
within a sphere
where he receives the expression
and interiorizes it, dilates it.
But in cinema, a gunshot is an explosion.
It makes you jump.
Or someone on an armchair -.
So I'm speaking of the need
to be expressive,
in the expressionist sense of the word,
allusive, yet at the same time
quite concrete, credible.
The episode you're referring to,
which also makes me a little embarrassed,
as this armchair story makes me feel
like a furniture builder, went as follows:
This library needed large armchairs,
suitable for welcoming
a reader's meditations.
And we're speaking of readers
from a hundred years ago.
That armchair needed to be the armchair.
That's what it's about:
When you write,
you can write "the armchair."
When you're making cinema,
you can't have the armchair.
It's up to you to turn an armchair
into the armchair.
At the same time, it must appear to be
that specific armchair in everyone's eyes.
We may be boring our viewers
with this rambling about armchairs.
But armchairs are very important!
Indeed so!
Here's Fellini in the massive library
of his reconstructed ocean liner.
He's preparing a scene
with an elderly English actor:
One of the many in his huge cast.
Was assembling this cast
yet another challenge, filled with doubts?
- Was it a troublesome process?
- I can't stand -.
In a shot,
even one with crowds of people,
I can't stand it if even the last face
of an extra in a corner of the frame
is one I didn't choose,
haven't seen or don't know.
If I don't know why I chose it,
the reasons behind that choice,
I'm unhappy.
My conscience doesn't feel right.
I need to appropriate,
possess, beget, control,
to be responsible for everything
that appears in the shot:
- Faces, furniture, tapestry, colors.
- But above all, faces.
I think it's dangerous,
in a story like this one,
for the audience to recognize an actor
and remember him from another film.
Every actor is associated
with a previous film,
with its story, costumes, makeup.
As the characters of my story
have all disappeared, passed away,
I needed faces
that would immediately communicate
a sensation of something alien, unknown.
A feeling we have when we look
at photographs of people who have died.
Photographs of dead people
are extraordinarily fascinating.
They are vague, phantasmal testimonies
of something that was, but is no more.
They are extremely fascinating.
Due to the simple fact of having died,
even the roughest face of a dead person
acquires extraordinary authority
and charm.
Obviously, I couldn't cast dead actors
for the film.
I couldn't build
a cast of deceased people.
As I couldn't highlight the fact that time
has canceled certain faces,
I focused on the unfamiliarity created
by distance, by different nationalities.
Here's a view of the stern
of Fellini's great ship,
during one of the last shooting sessions
on this set.
Ever since he imagined it,
the director meticulously drew
this massive set.
It was conceived, designed and written,
just like the whole story of this ship.
We proceeded by sectors, by segments,
to build the ship
and all of its various structures.
The deck, the stern, the prow,
the hall, the engine room,
were all built here,
in Stage 5 at Cinecittà.
Where sea sickness is not common,
but the set features
a wave system, if I'm not mistaken.
Yes, we had an engineer build a system
that simulates
the oscillation and rolling of the sea,
So do people really get seasick?
I was slightly worried.
This machinery is so perfect,
that it feels as if you really are
aboard a ship at sea.
- I'm prone to seasickness.
- There you go!
On the first day of rehearsals,
when we weren't yet shooting,
and almost nobody from the cast or troupe
was around,
when this massive platform started moving,
I had a moment of bewilderment,
as I felt a bit dizzy.
I thought,
"How will I direct an entire film,
with this feeling of imbalance?"
Ultimately, as always occurs,
work is so protective and therapeutic
that it removes any discomfort,
any hindrance.
- You got used to it.
- I remember that in some occasions,
I came to Cinecittà
with a temperature of 38° Celsius,
and all I needed to do was enter
the magical atmosphere of the spotlights,
be among the members of the troupe,
and be forced to step
into the clothes of the director,
that all my symptoms would disappear.
Temperature, illness, headaches.
They say every ship meets its storm,
iceberg, sea monster or whale.
That's the fun of traveling.
A fully safe journey,
completely protected from any sudden
and unexpected incident
would no longer be a journey.
What about your ocean liner?
No, everything went fine.
Our navigation was serene,
apart from typical incidents
that happen whenever you make a film.
Like going over budget
by a few billion lire.
That's the minimum that can happen.
It's expected from the start.
In Cinecittà's Stage 5, Fellini
has announced the end of production
for his film And the Ship Sails On,
exactly four months
after another press conference,
during which he announced its beginning.
The film was made
in 14 weeks, as expected.
The press conference wasn't called
to highlight this fact
as something exceptional.
Many films have been made
within the expected time frame.
Nowadays it's more difficult,
because the production of a film,
and especially a big film like this one,
despite all the sessions,
meetings and forecasts -.
A journey like this can lead you
on unknown routes, variable seas...
A good metaphor,
since the film's about a ship.
It was quite a heavy, claustrophobic film:
I've always shot in Cinecittà.
I've always made my films in the studio,
because I believe it's the place
that's best suited to making a film.
But when making other films,
we'd spend a couple of days in Ostia,
Fregene, Maccarese.
I never took my troupe very far.
They often ask me, "Will we make it
as far as Viterbo this time?"
This time we didn't. We entered Stage 5,
and the furthest we went was
from Stage 5 to Stage 7, from 7 to 12,
from 12 back to 5.
So after four months
of slightly forced cohabitation,
this led to a sensation of heaviness,
which dissolved yesterday evening,
with the end of the film.
Actually, I'm already starting
to feel nostalgic.
CINEMA IN VENICE
This table, where filmmakers
traditionally sit
for morning press conferences,
was today supposed
to welcome Federico Fellini,
but the room is empty instead.
Fellini then flew in from Rome
in the early afternoon with his wife.
He kept the time
of his arrival in Venice secret,
but hadn't anticipated Alitalia computers
recording the data of his booking,
that were cunningly consulted
by journalists and photographers.
So he was met at the Marco Polo Airport
by the usual army of excited reporters.
Yesterday, Fellini had sent
a telegram to Gian Luigi Rondi,
apologizing for his absence
at the press conference.
He added that "Relentless, demanding
and even affectionate questions
from journalists
have always plunged me
into an abyss of discomfort.
I don't want to provide interpretations
of what I've made, and am unable to."
Fellini's ship has finally landed
at the Lido.
The title obviously invites such puns.
The Fellini of his 18th film
is a brand-new director.
Federico, The White Sheik
was presented in Venice in 1952.
I was the first to interview you,
and I said,
"Finally, Italian cinema
will have a great director."
More than 30 years have elapsed
from 1952 to today.
- What has changed for you?
- Can't you see? My hair's gone!
DIRECTOR
My hands tremble.
I stutter and can't concentrate,
so could you please repeat the question?
Fellini arrived in Venice a few hours ago,
and said he is happy
to be at a festival yet again,
but, in line with his character,
he also revealed
his doubts and fears.
I hope that the film I see this evening
is the same one I left 15 days ago...
That nobody's changed it!
I'm not worried about the film changing,
but there's always -.
A cinematic creation,
a film, in other words,
appears to resemble,
rather than an eternally unchangeable
artistic creation,
a living person.
Someone who is affected
by the moments
and places one meets him.
If you take the same film
and watch it this evening at the festival,
or in the cutting room,
or in a month's time in New York
or in Bergamo, or in a provincial theater,
at a certain time of day,
or with specific people,
and it will completely change its looks,
just like a person
who you meet in different places
or at different times.
This is why I say that I hope
this evening's film
is the same one I left 15 days ago:
That it has the same -.
That it represents me
as completely and totally
as I thought it did two weeks ago.
There's always the risk
of a film changing its face,
of it suddenly becoming arrogant,
boring or impatient.
Sometimes, the film also becomes
the mirror of its audience.
Yesterday was a very intense day,
spent almost entirely within
the comfortable Grand Hotel
and, in the evening,
in the nearby Novelli Theater
for the national premiere
of his latest film, And the Ship Sails On.
Many thought he wouldn't show up.
But finally, alongside Giulietta Masina,
he overcame his shyness
and faced a "laid-back, festive
and familiar" atmosphere,
as the great Federico
ironically described it,
during his sophisticated press conference.
Next, he appeared on Domenica In,
and Federico seemed perfectly at ease.
Thank you for accepting this invitation.
I know that Federico Fellini doesn't enjoy
cameras and interviews, is it true?
I'd promised you that sooner or later
I'd appear. Here I am!
Here I am in Rimini.
There's the Grand Hotel.
I'm always slightly uneasy,
because one of the forms
of alienation in my job
is to think that the things
one has used in a film,
people, objects,
even environments or entire cities,
have been canceled after serving
their purpose in the story.
So I'm surprised that the Grand Hotel,
which is in many of my films,
is still standing. I'm joking.
It actually reassures me.
It's a very warm and tender
point of reference,
as well as being nostalgic
and stimulating.
So I'm very happy to be here,
surrounded by friends,
who want to celebrate me
although I don't deserve it,
with triumphal arches, obelisks,
fireworks...
"This city evokes
a sleepy and murky charm."
Not everything I say in interviews
should be taken literally!
- Otherwise, I'll always be on trial!
- Of course.
I don't know. Maybe I was referring
to a curious and peculiar characteristic
of the town where I was born,
which is perfectly split
into two time periods,
which almost transform it.
There's a summertime Rimini,
flooded with life, phantasmagoric,
a city that has nothing to envy Las Vegas
or certain major American beaches.
Then, when fall comes, Rimini changes.
It disappears, changes pace
and becomes another city.
When I said "sleepy and murky charm,"
I was probably referring to wintertime:
To the fascination
of this sort of incubation
in preparation for a new solar explosion.
Federico Fellini temporarily left Rimini
in 1936,
and when he returned in 1946,
he no longer recognized the city.
- I couldn't recognize it?
- You found it had changed.
Well, the war had taken place
in the meantime,
and those were terrible years.
Rimini was also among the most martyrized
and tormented towns during the war.
I think that, after Cassino,
it was the most bombed town in Italy.
It was truly in ruins.
I remember that when I returned
after the long and atrocious war,
it was very shocking.
The city no longer existed,
it was a sea of debris.
When I got off that black train
and was surrounded
by the lunar white of the debris,
what really got to me
was the sound of a voice calling a woman.
The woman's name was Vesperina,
a typical name in our region.
Hearing that accent,
that dialect amidst the desolation
touched my heart and moved me intensely.
Rimini then bounced back quickly.
I think that's part of the spirit
of the local people.
These are very fervent,
laborious and active people.
Shall we browse through your photo album
and look at some images
from your childhood?
Is that okay with you?
That depends. Are we starting
with ones where I'm laying on a goatskin
- with my bottom in the air?
- No, we removed those ones!
That's me with my brother Riccardo.
- Where are you?
- What should I say? "What a pretty child?"
Well, he is a pretty child, it's true.
Both of them.
- Let's keep going. Next image.
- Let's go.
- Here you are for your First Communion.
- A classic photo: The First Communion.
Yes, these images
do feature classic moments.
- Of course.
- Let's keep going. Next image.
If we're supposed to get to recent ones,
we're going to be here all day!
Yes, we'll still be looking
at photos at midnight!
Let's comment on this one.
Here, as you can see,
I'm wearing a partisan uniform.
This type of uniform was unavoidable.
This is when I was an Avanguardista.
I could narrate my own personal resistance
to fascist conditioning...
- What do you mean?
- Maybe another time.
Here's another photo.
- I'm in high school in this one.
- In high school.
That's Bertini, nicknamed King Kong.
As you can see.
Why?
If you zoom in on him, you'll see why.
He looked a lot like a monkey.
It was typical in schools
that everyone had a nickname.
I was dubbed Gandhi
because I was extremely thin.
Extremely thin.
Is this photo in Rimini or...
In this one I'm thin because I was hungry.
It's from my early days in Rome.
As you can see, I was almost a beggar.
Here's an important image
for the history of entertainment.
Yes, with Aldo Fabrizi.
He was a sort of good ogre,
a big brother, a journey companion,
during my early days in Rome.
And you wrote sketches for him.
Yes, I wrote jokes,
sketches and short songs.
I've done all sorts of things.
I left nothing out.
I went through the classic, American-style
period of the "self-made man."
- Right.
- I never sold newspapers,
but if cinema keeps sinking,
I may end up doing that too.
We hope not, obviously.
What is the meaning of the province
for Federico Fellini?
One can be a man from the province,
without being a provincial man.
I've answered this question
with all the films I made.
I think...
my roots are based in very fertile,
deep and stimulating grounds.
To the extent that I never was able
to consider as reductive
or belittling
the definition some critics
used for my films:
"Films by a provincial man."
However, this province,
this Romagna where I was born...
must have unlimited boundaries,
as I see these "provincial films"
are appreciated in New York,
Brazil, India, everywhere!
So this Romagna must basically be
as big as the globe itself.
We can say,
"The whole world is a province."
Yes, let's say so.
Plume in the summer wind.
Waywardly playing.
Ne'er one way swaying.
Each whim obeying.
Plume in the summer wind.
Waywardly playing.
Ne'er one way swaying.
Each whim obeying.
Three "average viewer" questions
for Federico Fellini on his latest film.
As is the case for inspired works,
And the Ship Sails On is a film
that can be read on multiple levels.
Critics saw it as a metaphor
for the journey of life,
an allusion to the twilight of a society,
an allegory of fears
of an atomic catastrophe,
an argument on art and mass media,
a cry of alarm comforted by tenacious hope
in the resources of nature.
Among all these possible interpretations,
which do you find
to be the most legitimate
and closest to your artistic intentions?
Is that all?
I thought there were many more!
Each of them has its own justification.
I think a film, a book, a painting,
any artistic expression by an artist
who has his own vision of the world
and offers it honestly and in good faith,
even if dazzled by a dose
of the subconscious
or irrationality he may have poured
into his work -.
Interpretations are authorized
and legitimate.
This is why I'm so diffident and resistant
when it comes to positioning myself
between the audience and the film,
in an attempt to provide readings,
or interpretations, explanations.
I feel as if I'm depriving the film
of its most secret charm:
That it can appear different
to every single viewer.
Thus, I think that all interpretations
have their own justifications,
as they are all borne
of the strictly private relationship
the spectator, the onlooker, the viewer,
enjoys with the film, in this case,
or in any case, with an author's work.
Although the journalist-narrator
forecasts optimistic hypotheses
of many people
being rescued from the ship,
the epilogue of the film
shows us merely two survivors,
aboard a tiny Noah's Ark:
The journalist himself
and the female rhinoceros,
whose milk is fortunately excellent.
What symbol should we see
in this provident animal? Is there one?
You can see anything you want in it.
Obviously, not everything an artist does
is planned and rationalized.
Of course,
every tiny detail can be interpreted.
As in the case with dreams,
where every single element,
the general atmosphere and the details
each have a meaning,
the same is true for images in films:
Just like in dreams,
all it takes is a little good will,
and we can assign everything
an interpretation.
I will once again repeat
that I'm uncomfortable
standing there with a ruler,
like a teacher in an elementary school,
and pointing out where Ireland,
Greenland and the Arctic Ocean are.
I'd much prefer for the film to speak,
for it to communicate directly,
on a conscious or subconscious level,
its message, its myths, its fable,
what it wants to say.
Average viewers complain that,
in Fellini's more uncompromising films,
there are not enough likable
and positive characters
with whom they can identify.
In And the Ship Sails On, for example,
with the exception of the journalist,
the girl who falls for the Serbian
terrorist and very few others,
the characters are mostly ridiculous,
grotesque, arrogant,
petty, depraved or simply unpleasant.
Why was this choice made?
Doesn't Fellini worry
it may disappoint his audience?
I don't find these characters
vile or unpleasant.
They are just characters.
If I'm representing a society, a humanity,
I think I'm forced to differentiate it,
not just to build different masks
and psychological types,
but to represent
the world that surrounds us,
where people are motivated by vanity,
childishness, selfishness...
arrogance.
I find that each of them,
in representing a personality trait...
of the human being, deserves sympathy.
Fellini's ship has landed
at the Quirinal Palace.
Indeed, Pertini requested
that the great director's latest film
be projected in the small theater
of the Presidency of the Republic.
Following normal practice,
only a few qualified guests were invited.
Among those who watched the film
in the Quirinale,
were the Minister of the Interior,
Scalfaro,
Fellini, of course, with Giulietta Masina,
plus Agnes and Zauli, representing RAI,
that coproduced the film.
It's a distraction for me.
I can't go to the cinema.
My collaborators won't allow me to.
They say I can go to the theater,
but in the cinema,
the lights are switched off,
and anyone can come in or out.
So it could be dangerous.
But we know you were particularly anxious
to see this...
That's right. This is a director
I have always loved.
He has inventiveness, fantasy, and so on.
I have always loved his work deeply.
Is Fellini excited about
this presidential viewing?
I'm always excited when watching
one of my films,
especially in this setting.
We now enjoy this pleasant ritual.
I have the honor of presenting my film
to the President every other year,
and I hope this custom continues forever.
AND THE SHIP SAILS ON
The ship of Italian cinema
is taking on water, or so they say.
I think cinema has entered
an extremely serious crisis.
I think the device
we are appearing on right now
in viewers' homes,
if they haven't already switched channel
with that other device of theirs,
has formed and brought up
an ocean of impatient,
indifferent, distracted
and vaguely racist viewers.
That little device is an execution squad.
It removes your face,
takes away your speech, erases you.
Watching four films at the same time
may appear to be the endeavor of a genius,
of someone possessing
who knows what superpowers.
In truth, it's nothing more than
the inability to pay a little attention
to whoever is speaking,
inability to let oneself be seduced
and enchanted by a story.
Cinema was exactly this,
hypnotic and ritualistic suggestion.
It was an almost religious experience.
You would go out,
park the car somewhere and get in line.
There were a whole series of rituals.
The tickets, the curtain, ushers,
looking at the semi-illuminated crowd,
recognizing some friends.
Then the lights would dim,
the screen would light up,
and thus began the revelation,
the message.
This was an ancient, perennial ritual,
which may have changed form and means,
but it was still the same.
You were there to listen.
Today, people -.
Today I find that all of this
has been completely destroyed.
- This attitude is missing.
- Some people prefer to watch television.
Yes, but they have no respect.
With their little device,
a sort of laser that erases and removes.
As soon as the contents don't feature
sensationalist hooks,
they immediately skip.
You jump from a film to a soccer game,
from a soccer match to a quiz show,
from a quiz show
to an advertisement for diapers.
I think this way of listening to a speaker
is villainous.
Naturally, the speaker in question
will be humiliated and mortified,
in a position
where nobody is listening to him.
And yet, this is what has occurred.
I think we're living
in such an anxious, threatened
and frightful historical season,
that we feel we can't intervene,
interfere or bear any weight
when it comes to general determinations.
It would appear that all that's left
for an artist, if I may use this word,
for a creator, is the role of the witness:
He has the duty of bearing witness.
It's all right not to choose an ideology,
not to pick a side of any kind,
but commitment to a lucid awareness
of what is going on
is, in my opinion, a duty we all share.
During the crash with the battleship,
you detach from the film,
you move back and distance yourself.
- I was wondering why.
- I don't distance myself.
- Is it reassuring?
- It still has to do with being a witness.
This catastrophe...
conceived and built on the screen,
doesn't aim
to menacingly announce
any immediate apocalypses,
nor does it attempt,
more or less arrogantly,
to recommend an attitude or a choice.
Therefore, in that point,
I think the author of the film, Fellini,
shows that he has no possibility
of providing
an immediate ideological judgment
so he shows he is merely a narrator,
someone who is telling this story.
The sense and conclusions
of the story are entrusted
to each individual viewer.
- Personally, I -
- It's a gesture of -.
I think I interpret it
as a gesture of modesty, humility,
and even a way
of admitting my limitations.
I'm a director.
I didn't tell this story
to frighten people, nor to preach,
because I am just a director.
See? The set is fake!
The witness can find salvation,
if he is a witness,
and in his role as a witness,
by drinking rhino milk.
I'm not here to advertise rhino milk,
which I don't think is even on the market.
I've been asked so many times
what the rhinoceros means.
People even stop me on the street and say,
"I liked the film,
but I didn't understand the rhinoceros."
I still haven't prepared a funny answer,
nor one that may solve
this distressing query.
We may say,
in maybe too irresponsibly
psychoanalytical a way,
that the protagonist, Orlando,
survives because
his good faith as a witness,
his good faith in recording good and evil,
right and wrong, life as it is,
is the attitude of someone
who is nourished
even by the monstrous aspects of life,
by its deformed and bestial aspects.
Indeed,
he claims that rhino milk is delicious.
It actually annoys me to translate it
into such heavily pedagogic terms,
but since it appeared to be an issue
for so many viewers,
I'd like to tell them,
"Try drinking rhino milk,
and you'll see your boat won't sink.
It'll miraculously stay afloat,
thanks to this acceptance of obscure
and irrational aspects of yourselves."
- We'd like to thank you. I'm grateful.
- No, I thank you.
- Do you want to re-watch it now?
- What?
- The interview.
- Just a little.
Okay, let's watch it.
Don't talk. If this is a listening spot,
you should listen, not talk!
Can I please hear
what the dottore is saying?
FELLINI RACCONTA 2
DIARY OF A FILM
See? I have this whole hand movement
that's typical of Italians when speaking.
The dottore is speaking.
He's speaking. You're listening. Yes.
Next time -
You don't have to answer this,
you answer instead.
What's the next film you're doing?
- Do you know yet?
- We don't. We'd like -.
You weren't supposed to talk.
You're listening to me.
I'm just pretending to talk
so you can occasionally nod.
Dottore, can you say something?
- Me?
- Yes. Just move your arm and hand,
anyway your voice won't be audible here.
There you go.
I can move my leg too.
There you go, raise a leg!
It's a ballet!
WE APOLOGIZE TO THE AUDIENCE
FOR THE QUALITY OF SOME IMAGES
TAKEN FROM CUT OR UNRELEASED MATERIAL
DUE TO DEFECTS IN THE ORIGINAL VIDEOS
FOR THE QUALITY OF SOME IMAGES
TAKEN FROM CUT OR UNRELEASED MATERIAL
DUE TO DEFECTS IN THE ORIGINAL VIDEOS
I remember that the first signs
of the film
came from a small piece of news
that had struck me,
regarding the funeral of a famous singer.
She had asked to be cremated,
and had left instructions in her will
concerning the ritual
to scatter her ashes.
This news had captured my attention.
We spoke about it with Tonino Guerra,
and after starting off on a labyrinthine,
chaotic path,
we gradually managed
to bring the story into focus.
The script took a very short time
to write, just a couple of weeks.
How was your relationship
with Tonino Guerra?
Excellent. We're on the same page.
I had already made Amarcord with him.
We've known each other for 40 years.
We work together
in a very complementary and free way.
There are no problems.
I've mostly had good relationships
with writers.
- First of all because...
- He's from your area.
No, besides Tonino,
I meant more in general:
With Flaiano, Pinelli,
Bernardino Zapponi, Brunello Rondi.
- I've always had very-
- Is it also a relationship of complicity?
Yes, our complicity comes
from allowing ourselves to be plunged,
consciously or maybe not,
into a vaguely Vitelloni-like
after-school atmosphere.
Like having to do homework.
We tackle things with a rather boorish
and shrewd attitude,
just trying to get them done,
one way or another.
This vague atmosphere, which I find
to be nurturing and not inappropriate,
is what turns the relationship
into a form of playful friendship.
Therefore,
working is no longer just a job.
I never manage to build
a definitive screenplay.
This is also because, having worked
for many years as a screenwriter,
and having written many scripts
before becoming a director,
I have the ambition and presumption
of being able to fix things on the spot,
even if I start production on a film
without having a fully defined script.
There comes a time in which I need
to start looking the film in its face.
FELLINI RACCONTA 2 - DIARY OF A FILM
AND THE SHIP SAILS ON
FELLINI TO STARBOARD
The anticipated announcement
came unexpected in Cinecittà's Stage 5,
this time Fellini and his ship
are hoisting the anchors.
...a certain relevance
on a personal level too.
I'm getting on in years.
I've turned 60, so -.
- Is today the 13th?
- Yes.
Great! Everything is following
the most catastrophic signs!
No less than seven sets will be used
to reconstruct the famous ship.
The huge boilers of the engine room
are almost full-scale.
Powerful pneumatic hammers
support a large platform
where the central hall
of the ship is built:
Thanks to an electronic device,
these hammers will help simulate
the oscillation and rolling
of the steamship on the waves.
None of the characters who populate
the ship will be played by famous actors.
There's a specific reason for this.
None of them are celebrities.
I made this choice deliberately.
As the film tells a story
which supposedly took place
more than one hundred years ago,
I thought that, since it's the story
of people who have disappeared,
on whom we have no more information,
since they've all turned to dust,
unknown faces could increase
a sense of curiosity
and return these characters
to their dimension as unknown people
who have vanished.
The story emerges slowly.
Finally,
Fellini explains the sense of the film.
"Today," says the director,
"we live in a world of hyper-information,
and this world conditions us."
I think the heart of the film,
the sense of the film refers
to the need to subconsciously desire
a piece of news
concerning an event so...
immense and devastating,
that we can hope for it to provoke
some kind of reaction within us.
Naturally, the film doesn't have
such an apocalyptic tone.
It's a very funny, comical
and adventurous story.
I also hope it will be fun
for the audience,
even if its heart aims
to expose a theme
that I think concerns us all.
We start in two days' time,
in an outdoor set,
built in a space in the Tiburtino area...
where we will try to recreate
the Port of Naples
from one hundred years ago.
Out of the shot! Clear the area.
Come on. Action!
The long delay
in beginning work on this film
is due to the fact
that Italian cinema in general
is going through quite a dramatic
and deep crisis.
Therefore, this project was also affected
by the delays...
stagnation and resistances of a situation
that involves cinema as a whole,
not this film in particular.
I am the glorious victim
of myths and legends
for which I thank my friends in the press.
I mean that sincerely, without irony.
Some claim that I don't talk
about the film
because I don't know what I'm making.
On the contrary, Fellini is well aware
of what he wants to do.
However, he's usually very mysterious.
Why is that?
My tendency to resist revealing
or talking about my films
isn't the result of vanity
or a desire to provoke despair
in my friends, the journalists.
It isn't skillfully designed
to create a feeling of curiosity
or suspense about the film.
It's a resistance related
to very profound reasons.
I feel as if I'm invited to gossip,
to snitch
and provide information
about something I don't yet fully know,
something that has every right to remain
in a more private and intimate dimension.
It makes me feel indiscreet.
Come forward.
Smile.
Move away.
Come forward.
Smile, they're taking your photograph!
Put your hands on your hips.
Smile. Look backwards.
Look here again. Smile.
Now go very slowly.
Look straight ahead. Smile with joy.
Go on, take him away.
No. You're giving away that he's coming.
You shouldn't.
- When I feel him grab me.
- No, later!
You shouldn't look when he comes near.
You should be smiling!
- Alberto, come here!
- It's Attilio!
Did you do a good job?
This is how you must grab him, okay?
You don't like talking about the story
before the film is released...
I'm unable to do so faithfully.
The relationship between creator
and creation is very secret and intimate.
- And fragile. Delicate.
- Yes, fragile. Delicate.
It's constantly placed in doubt,
repudiated.
It can suddenly turn dim and disappear.
One morning, you feel that your film
won't greet you. It turns its back on you.
On other mornings, it meets you festively.
What does "telling a story" mean?
A story is nothing. It's merely a story.
It's revealing the feelings
behind the story that embarrasses me.
It makes me feel embarrassed,
but also totally reluctant and resistant.
Therefore,
I prefer to make up another story.
I often do this with my friends
in the press.
But then I feel bitter, because I realize
that the story I made up
is better than the one I'm working on.
Pull it up!
Careful with the tubes. Okay.
- Action, Vittorio!
- No, no! Wait a moment!
Look over here. Smile.
Raise your head as soon
as you put your hand on the ship's wheel.
I've brought a camp kitchen.
I must say that,
of all the stages a film goes through
before its actual production,
casting is the most torturous,
despite being the most fascinating:
In the end, a face must carry the sense,
the message, the story.
In this film, more than others,
the need to choose with extreme precision
was particularly present:
You see a series of faces,
and you give each of them -.
Your imagination assigns them a story,
situations, feelings, tics,
without actually knowing if they're exact.
This film aims to restore in the viewer
the mysterious and ineffable charm
transmitted by photography.
If you browse through a photo album
of people you don't know,
especially if they are dead people,
from the previous century,
you're immediately pervaded,
attracted by interest
in stories that you don't know,
but are hinted at by the face,
the attire, the attitude.
Going back to these characters,
the cast includes some members,
like Peter Cellier and Barbara Jefford,
who are excellent English theater actors,
highly experienced and capable
of going from Shakespeare to...
- To Fellini.
- ...to Fellini!
Other cast members aren't actors at all.
They're people you found in Naples.
What issues do you face
when working simultaneously
with great professionals
and people who can barely mutter a word?
I must confess I've never had issues
with actors.
If a character has been chosen
according to what a face expresses,
and that's the face of an actor,
that's good,
as we can enjoy a professional
relationship and understanding.
Sometimes, it's also easier to explain
the needs of a character to an actor.
If it's not an actor,
but just the character,
perhaps, in a certain way,
that's even better:
He'll move with his own autonomy
and spontaneity.
Therefore, I leave that margin...
for spontaneous expression
which I believe is the essential condition
for characters, initially conceived
on a cold page of the script,
to rediscover the personal
and unpredictable elements
each human being bears within itself,
making it a unique and unrepeatable type.
I deeply admire actors.
Ever since I was a child,
I envisioned actors as semi-divine beings.
The first time I understood
what actors were,
I thought they lived
in the magical dimension
beyond the theater curtain:
In those lights, environments,
strange gardens,
or living rooms, or mansions.
I also thought they remained dressed up
even after the show.
I can explain this fantasy
with the fact that I was six or seven.
Maybe even younger.
I thought their faces
were of different colors,
their eyes were longer
and their eyebrows were blacker.
They had curls and wigs,
and extraordinary voices:
I thought they were supernatural beings,
to the extent that I identified them
with their character.
And this still conditions me.
So I think that in the evening,
after shooting,
they're still the character.
Or maybe their life stops,
and they're deposited like worn clothes
in a hotel room wardrobe,
ready for collection the next day,
when production vehicles
will take them to the theater
and they'll be returned to life
as the spotlights are lit.
Scene 34/13, first take!
Slowly look at the hand, Fiorenzo. Smile.
Take it.
Fiorenzo, slowly lower your head
while smiling.
Lower your head, and smile.
Look at the hand, Fiorenzo.
Smile. Take it.
Good, that's it.
That's good.
This film attempts
an apparently anti-cinematic operation:
To avoid the pre-fabricated novel,
a story planned beforehand.
Preparing an original script
is naturally indispensable,
not just to gain a clear view
of the story you want to tell,
but also for organizational matters.
You're well aware that materializing
that which inhabits
the foggy and chaotic sphere
of imagination,
is an advanced mathematical operation.
It requires absolute precision.
It's like sending a missile into orbit.
Not that I'm trying to cast
a legendary and romantic halo
on the working of creativity.
Careful over here! Spray the walls!
Go on! Slightly less!
Go! Be careful over there!
Ready? Go!
No more smoke!
No more smoke!
Now focus on the water!
Go with flames over there!
Up front, here!
We need to prepare it
a second before shooting!
In the end, for this film,
I chose to use well-known music:
The music of great classical composers,
and opera in particular.
The film features music by Verdi, Rossini,
Tchaikovsky, Bellini, Schubert.
In my total ignorance of musical matters,
I went searching for the striking
and indestructible emotions,
whether seductive or saddening,
I have received from music
over the course of my life.
So this film features
all the musical pieces
I listened to as a defenseless child,
an adolescent, and later on in life.
Camera!
Serious faces, okay?
Can you hear me? When I say "Action!"
You count one, two, three,
and then you look down.
And keep smiling.
Scene 29/24, first take!
Sea movement. Playback.
Go with the ship!
Motion!
Sea motion. Stop there.
During these long months of preparation,
I enjoyed the possibility of discovering
something a viewer of the film
may not imagine:
The immense work that you...
I don't know if other directors do this,
but you work on every tiny detail
composing the picture of your film.
I believe, perhaps a little emphatically,
that cinema is an art that shares
the same needs as other arts.
You'd never tell a writer, "I'm surprised
you insert the adjectives yourself,
the adverbs, the apostrophes,
the full stops."
You're not letting the editor
or typographer -.
As if these things could be left
to others!
You wouldn't ask a painter if he added
the green parts of a painting himself.
For example, I saw that when you needed
some armchairs for a scene,
you asked for one armchair
in particular to be remade many times.
Each time, you found it too small
or that its backrest was too low.
Of course. Cinema,
differently than writing or painting,
has a need for greater realism,
because the characters move and speak.
In cinema, a gunshot
is an actual detonation.
It makes you jump.
If you write,
"The gun fired. A shot was heard,"
the reader will hear the shot
within a sphere
where he receives the expression
and interiorizes it, dilates it.
But in cinema, a gunshot is an explosion.
It makes you jump.
Or someone on an armchair -.
So I'm speaking of the need
to be expressive,
in the expressionist sense of the word,
allusive, yet at the same time
quite concrete, credible.
The episode you're referring to,
which also makes me a little embarrassed,
as this armchair story makes me feel
like a furniture builder, went as follows:
This library needed large armchairs,
suitable for welcoming
a reader's meditations.
And we're speaking of readers
from a hundred years ago.
That armchair needed to be the armchair.
That's what it's about:
When you write,
you can write "the armchair."
When you're making cinema,
you can't have the armchair.
It's up to you to turn an armchair
into the armchair.
At the same time, it must appear to be
that specific armchair in everyone's eyes.
We may be boring our viewers
with this rambling about armchairs.
But armchairs are very important!
Indeed so!
Here's Fellini in the massive library
of his reconstructed ocean liner.
He's preparing a scene
with an elderly English actor:
One of the many in his huge cast.
Was assembling this cast
yet another challenge, filled with doubts?
- Was it a troublesome process?
- I can't stand -.
In a shot,
even one with crowds of people,
I can't stand it if even the last face
of an extra in a corner of the frame
is one I didn't choose,
haven't seen or don't know.
If I don't know why I chose it,
the reasons behind that choice,
I'm unhappy.
My conscience doesn't feel right.
I need to appropriate,
possess, beget, control,
to be responsible for everything
that appears in the shot:
- Faces, furniture, tapestry, colors.
- But above all, faces.
I think it's dangerous,
in a story like this one,
for the audience to recognize an actor
and remember him from another film.
Every actor is associated
with a previous film,
with its story, costumes, makeup.
As the characters of my story
have all disappeared, passed away,
I needed faces
that would immediately communicate
a sensation of something alien, unknown.
A feeling we have when we look
at photographs of people who have died.
Photographs of dead people
are extraordinarily fascinating.
They are vague, phantasmal testimonies
of something that was, but is no more.
They are extremely fascinating.
Due to the simple fact of having died,
even the roughest face of a dead person
acquires extraordinary authority
and charm.
Obviously, I couldn't cast dead actors
for the film.
I couldn't build
a cast of deceased people.
As I couldn't highlight the fact that time
has canceled certain faces,
I focused on the unfamiliarity created
by distance, by different nationalities.
Here's a view of the stern
of Fellini's great ship,
during one of the last shooting sessions
on this set.
Ever since he imagined it,
the director meticulously drew
this massive set.
It was conceived, designed and written,
just like the whole story of this ship.
We proceeded by sectors, by segments,
to build the ship
and all of its various structures.
The deck, the stern, the prow,
the hall, the engine room,
were all built here,
in Stage 5 at Cinecittà.
Where sea sickness is not common,
but the set features
a wave system, if I'm not mistaken.
Yes, we had an engineer build a system
that simulates
the oscillation and rolling of the sea,
So do people really get seasick?
I was slightly worried.
This machinery is so perfect,
that it feels as if you really are
aboard a ship at sea.
- I'm prone to seasickness.
- There you go!
On the first day of rehearsals,
when we weren't yet shooting,
and almost nobody from the cast or troupe
was around,
when this massive platform started moving,
I had a moment of bewilderment,
as I felt a bit dizzy.
I thought,
"How will I direct an entire film,
with this feeling of imbalance?"
Ultimately, as always occurs,
work is so protective and therapeutic
that it removes any discomfort,
any hindrance.
- You got used to it.
- I remember that in some occasions,
I came to Cinecittà
with a temperature of 38° Celsius,
and all I needed to do was enter
the magical atmosphere of the spotlights,
be among the members of the troupe,
and be forced to step
into the clothes of the director,
that all my symptoms would disappear.
Temperature, illness, headaches.
They say every ship meets its storm,
iceberg, sea monster or whale.
That's the fun of traveling.
A fully safe journey,
completely protected from any sudden
and unexpected incident
would no longer be a journey.
What about your ocean liner?
No, everything went fine.
Our navigation was serene,
apart from typical incidents
that happen whenever you make a film.
Like going over budget
by a few billion lire.
That's the minimum that can happen.
It's expected from the start.
In Cinecittà's Stage 5, Fellini
has announced the end of production
for his film And the Ship Sails On,
exactly four months
after another press conference,
during which he announced its beginning.
The film was made
in 14 weeks, as expected.
The press conference wasn't called
to highlight this fact
as something exceptional.
Many films have been made
within the expected time frame.
Nowadays it's more difficult,
because the production of a film,
and especially a big film like this one,
despite all the sessions,
meetings and forecasts -.
A journey like this can lead you
on unknown routes, variable seas...
A good metaphor,
since the film's about a ship.
It was quite a heavy, claustrophobic film:
I've always shot in Cinecittà.
I've always made my films in the studio,
because I believe it's the place
that's best suited to making a film.
But when making other films,
we'd spend a couple of days in Ostia,
Fregene, Maccarese.
I never took my troupe very far.
They often ask me, "Will we make it
as far as Viterbo this time?"
This time we didn't. We entered Stage 5,
and the furthest we went was
from Stage 5 to Stage 7, from 7 to 12,
from 12 back to 5.
So after four months
of slightly forced cohabitation,
this led to a sensation of heaviness,
which dissolved yesterday evening,
with the end of the film.
Actually, I'm already starting
to feel nostalgic.
CINEMA IN VENICE
This table, where filmmakers
traditionally sit
for morning press conferences,
was today supposed
to welcome Federico Fellini,
but the room is empty instead.
Fellini then flew in from Rome
in the early afternoon with his wife.
He kept the time
of his arrival in Venice secret,
but hadn't anticipated Alitalia computers
recording the data of his booking,
that were cunningly consulted
by journalists and photographers.
So he was met at the Marco Polo Airport
by the usual army of excited reporters.
Yesterday, Fellini had sent
a telegram to Gian Luigi Rondi,
apologizing for his absence
at the press conference.
He added that "Relentless, demanding
and even affectionate questions
from journalists
have always plunged me
into an abyss of discomfort.
I don't want to provide interpretations
of what I've made, and am unable to."
Fellini's ship has finally landed
at the Lido.
The title obviously invites such puns.
The Fellini of his 18th film
is a brand-new director.
Federico, The White Sheik
was presented in Venice in 1952.
I was the first to interview you,
and I said,
"Finally, Italian cinema
will have a great director."
More than 30 years have elapsed
from 1952 to today.
- What has changed for you?
- Can't you see? My hair's gone!
DIRECTOR
My hands tremble.
I stutter and can't concentrate,
so could you please repeat the question?
Fellini arrived in Venice a few hours ago,
and said he is happy
to be at a festival yet again,
but, in line with his character,
he also revealed
his doubts and fears.
I hope that the film I see this evening
is the same one I left 15 days ago...
That nobody's changed it!
I'm not worried about the film changing,
but there's always -.
A cinematic creation,
a film, in other words,
appears to resemble,
rather than an eternally unchangeable
artistic creation,
a living person.
Someone who is affected
by the moments
and places one meets him.
If you take the same film
and watch it this evening at the festival,
or in the cutting room,
or in a month's time in New York
or in Bergamo, or in a provincial theater,
at a certain time of day,
or with specific people,
and it will completely change its looks,
just like a person
who you meet in different places
or at different times.
This is why I say that I hope
this evening's film
is the same one I left 15 days ago:
That it has the same -.
That it represents me
as completely and totally
as I thought it did two weeks ago.
There's always the risk
of a film changing its face,
of it suddenly becoming arrogant,
boring or impatient.
Sometimes, the film also becomes
the mirror of its audience.
Yesterday was a very intense day,
spent almost entirely within
the comfortable Grand Hotel
and, in the evening,
in the nearby Novelli Theater
for the national premiere
of his latest film, And the Ship Sails On.
Many thought he wouldn't show up.
But finally, alongside Giulietta Masina,
he overcame his shyness
and faced a "laid-back, festive
and familiar" atmosphere,
as the great Federico
ironically described it,
during his sophisticated press conference.
Next, he appeared on Domenica In,
and Federico seemed perfectly at ease.
Thank you for accepting this invitation.
I know that Federico Fellini doesn't enjoy
cameras and interviews, is it true?
I'd promised you that sooner or later
I'd appear. Here I am!
Here I am in Rimini.
There's the Grand Hotel.
I'm always slightly uneasy,
because one of the forms
of alienation in my job
is to think that the things
one has used in a film,
people, objects,
even environments or entire cities,
have been canceled after serving
their purpose in the story.
So I'm surprised that the Grand Hotel,
which is in many of my films,
is still standing. I'm joking.
It actually reassures me.
It's a very warm and tender
point of reference,
as well as being nostalgic
and stimulating.
So I'm very happy to be here,
surrounded by friends,
who want to celebrate me
although I don't deserve it,
with triumphal arches, obelisks,
fireworks...
"This city evokes
a sleepy and murky charm."
Not everything I say in interviews
should be taken literally!
- Otherwise, I'll always be on trial!
- Of course.
I don't know. Maybe I was referring
to a curious and peculiar characteristic
of the town where I was born,
which is perfectly split
into two time periods,
which almost transform it.
There's a summertime Rimini,
flooded with life, phantasmagoric,
a city that has nothing to envy Las Vegas
or certain major American beaches.
Then, when fall comes, Rimini changes.
It disappears, changes pace
and becomes another city.
When I said "sleepy and murky charm,"
I was probably referring to wintertime:
To the fascination
of this sort of incubation
in preparation for a new solar explosion.
Federico Fellini temporarily left Rimini
in 1936,
and when he returned in 1946,
he no longer recognized the city.
- I couldn't recognize it?
- You found it had changed.
Well, the war had taken place
in the meantime,
and those were terrible years.
Rimini was also among the most martyrized
and tormented towns during the war.
I think that, after Cassino,
it was the most bombed town in Italy.
It was truly in ruins.
I remember that when I returned
after the long and atrocious war,
it was very shocking.
The city no longer existed,
it was a sea of debris.
When I got off that black train
and was surrounded
by the lunar white of the debris,
what really got to me
was the sound of a voice calling a woman.
The woman's name was Vesperina,
a typical name in our region.
Hearing that accent,
that dialect amidst the desolation
touched my heart and moved me intensely.
Rimini then bounced back quickly.
I think that's part of the spirit
of the local people.
These are very fervent,
laborious and active people.
Shall we browse through your photo album
and look at some images
from your childhood?
Is that okay with you?
That depends. Are we starting
with ones where I'm laying on a goatskin
- with my bottom in the air?
- No, we removed those ones!
That's me with my brother Riccardo.
- Where are you?
- What should I say? "What a pretty child?"
Well, he is a pretty child, it's true.
Both of them.
- Let's keep going. Next image.
- Let's go.
- Here you are for your First Communion.
- A classic photo: The First Communion.
Yes, these images
do feature classic moments.
- Of course.
- Let's keep going. Next image.
If we're supposed to get to recent ones,
we're going to be here all day!
Yes, we'll still be looking
at photos at midnight!
Let's comment on this one.
Here, as you can see,
I'm wearing a partisan uniform.
This type of uniform was unavoidable.
This is when I was an Avanguardista.
I could narrate my own personal resistance
to fascist conditioning...
- What do you mean?
- Maybe another time.
Here's another photo.
- I'm in high school in this one.
- In high school.
That's Bertini, nicknamed King Kong.
As you can see.
Why?
If you zoom in on him, you'll see why.
He looked a lot like a monkey.
It was typical in schools
that everyone had a nickname.
I was dubbed Gandhi
because I was extremely thin.
Extremely thin.
Is this photo in Rimini or...
In this one I'm thin because I was hungry.
It's from my early days in Rome.
As you can see, I was almost a beggar.
Here's an important image
for the history of entertainment.
Yes, with Aldo Fabrizi.
He was a sort of good ogre,
a big brother, a journey companion,
during my early days in Rome.
And you wrote sketches for him.
Yes, I wrote jokes,
sketches and short songs.
I've done all sorts of things.
I left nothing out.
I went through the classic, American-style
period of the "self-made man."
- Right.
- I never sold newspapers,
but if cinema keeps sinking,
I may end up doing that too.
We hope not, obviously.
What is the meaning of the province
for Federico Fellini?
One can be a man from the province,
without being a provincial man.
I've answered this question
with all the films I made.
I think...
my roots are based in very fertile,
deep and stimulating grounds.
To the extent that I never was able
to consider as reductive
or belittling
the definition some critics
used for my films:
"Films by a provincial man."
However, this province,
this Romagna where I was born...
must have unlimited boundaries,
as I see these "provincial films"
are appreciated in New York,
Brazil, India, everywhere!
So this Romagna must basically be
as big as the globe itself.
We can say,
"The whole world is a province."
Yes, let's say so.
Plume in the summer wind.
Waywardly playing.
Ne'er one way swaying.
Each whim obeying.
Plume in the summer wind.
Waywardly playing.
Ne'er one way swaying.
Each whim obeying.
Three "average viewer" questions
for Federico Fellini on his latest film.
As is the case for inspired works,
And the Ship Sails On is a film
that can be read on multiple levels.
Critics saw it as a metaphor
for the journey of life,
an allusion to the twilight of a society,
an allegory of fears
of an atomic catastrophe,
an argument on art and mass media,
a cry of alarm comforted by tenacious hope
in the resources of nature.
Among all these possible interpretations,
which do you find
to be the most legitimate
and closest to your artistic intentions?
Is that all?
I thought there were many more!
Each of them has its own justification.
I think a film, a book, a painting,
any artistic expression by an artist
who has his own vision of the world
and offers it honestly and in good faith,
even if dazzled by a dose
of the subconscious
or irrationality he may have poured
into his work -.
Interpretations are authorized
and legitimate.
This is why I'm so diffident and resistant
when it comes to positioning myself
between the audience and the film,
in an attempt to provide readings,
or interpretations, explanations.
I feel as if I'm depriving the film
of its most secret charm:
That it can appear different
to every single viewer.
Thus, I think that all interpretations
have their own justifications,
as they are all borne
of the strictly private relationship
the spectator, the onlooker, the viewer,
enjoys with the film, in this case,
or in any case, with an author's work.
Although the journalist-narrator
forecasts optimistic hypotheses
of many people
being rescued from the ship,
the epilogue of the film
shows us merely two survivors,
aboard a tiny Noah's Ark:
The journalist himself
and the female rhinoceros,
whose milk is fortunately excellent.
What symbol should we see
in this provident animal? Is there one?
You can see anything you want in it.
Obviously, not everything an artist does
is planned and rationalized.
Of course,
every tiny detail can be interpreted.
As in the case with dreams,
where every single element,
the general atmosphere and the details
each have a meaning,
the same is true for images in films:
Just like in dreams,
all it takes is a little good will,
and we can assign everything
an interpretation.
I will once again repeat
that I'm uncomfortable
standing there with a ruler,
like a teacher in an elementary school,
and pointing out where Ireland,
Greenland and the Arctic Ocean are.
I'd much prefer for the film to speak,
for it to communicate directly,
on a conscious or subconscious level,
its message, its myths, its fable,
what it wants to say.
Average viewers complain that,
in Fellini's more uncompromising films,
there are not enough likable
and positive characters
with whom they can identify.
In And the Ship Sails On, for example,
with the exception of the journalist,
the girl who falls for the Serbian
terrorist and very few others,
the characters are mostly ridiculous,
grotesque, arrogant,
petty, depraved or simply unpleasant.
Why was this choice made?
Doesn't Fellini worry
it may disappoint his audience?
I don't find these characters
vile or unpleasant.
They are just characters.
If I'm representing a society, a humanity,
I think I'm forced to differentiate it,
not just to build different masks
and psychological types,
but to represent
the world that surrounds us,
where people are motivated by vanity,
childishness, selfishness...
arrogance.
I find that each of them,
in representing a personality trait...
of the human being, deserves sympathy.
Fellini's ship has landed
at the Quirinal Palace.
Indeed, Pertini requested
that the great director's latest film
be projected in the small theater
of the Presidency of the Republic.
Following normal practice,
only a few qualified guests were invited.
Among those who watched the film
in the Quirinale,
were the Minister of the Interior,
Scalfaro,
Fellini, of course, with Giulietta Masina,
plus Agnes and Zauli, representing RAI,
that coproduced the film.
It's a distraction for me.
I can't go to the cinema.
My collaborators won't allow me to.
They say I can go to the theater,
but in the cinema,
the lights are switched off,
and anyone can come in or out.
So it could be dangerous.
But we know you were particularly anxious
to see this...
That's right. This is a director
I have always loved.
He has inventiveness, fantasy, and so on.
I have always loved his work deeply.
Is Fellini excited about
this presidential viewing?
I'm always excited when watching
one of my films,
especially in this setting.
We now enjoy this pleasant ritual.
I have the honor of presenting my film
to the President every other year,
and I hope this custom continues forever.
AND THE SHIP SAILS ON
The ship of Italian cinema
is taking on water, or so they say.
I think cinema has entered
an extremely serious crisis.
I think the device
we are appearing on right now
in viewers' homes,
if they haven't already switched channel
with that other device of theirs,
has formed and brought up
an ocean of impatient,
indifferent, distracted
and vaguely racist viewers.
That little device is an execution squad.
It removes your face,
takes away your speech, erases you.
Watching four films at the same time
may appear to be the endeavor of a genius,
of someone possessing
who knows what superpowers.
In truth, it's nothing more than
the inability to pay a little attention
to whoever is speaking,
inability to let oneself be seduced
and enchanted by a story.
Cinema was exactly this,
hypnotic and ritualistic suggestion.
It was an almost religious experience.
You would go out,
park the car somewhere and get in line.
There were a whole series of rituals.
The tickets, the curtain, ushers,
looking at the semi-illuminated crowd,
recognizing some friends.
Then the lights would dim,
the screen would light up,
and thus began the revelation,
the message.
This was an ancient, perennial ritual,
which may have changed form and means,
but it was still the same.
You were there to listen.
Today, people -.
Today I find that all of this
has been completely destroyed.
- This attitude is missing.
- Some people prefer to watch television.
Yes, but they have no respect.
With their little device,
a sort of laser that erases and removes.
As soon as the contents don't feature
sensationalist hooks,
they immediately skip.
You jump from a film to a soccer game,
from a soccer match to a quiz show,
from a quiz show
to an advertisement for diapers.
I think this way of listening to a speaker
is villainous.
Naturally, the speaker in question
will be humiliated and mortified,
in a position
where nobody is listening to him.
And yet, this is what has occurred.
I think we're living
in such an anxious, threatened
and frightful historical season,
that we feel we can't intervene,
interfere or bear any weight
when it comes to general determinations.
It would appear that all that's left
for an artist, if I may use this word,
for a creator, is the role of the witness:
He has the duty of bearing witness.
It's all right not to choose an ideology,
not to pick a side of any kind,
but commitment to a lucid awareness
of what is going on
is, in my opinion, a duty we all share.
During the crash with the battleship,
you detach from the film,
you move back and distance yourself.
- I was wondering why.
- I don't distance myself.
- Is it reassuring?
- It still has to do with being a witness.
This catastrophe...
conceived and built on the screen,
doesn't aim
to menacingly announce
any immediate apocalypses,
nor does it attempt,
more or less arrogantly,
to recommend an attitude or a choice.
Therefore, in that point,
I think the author of the film, Fellini,
shows that he has no possibility
of providing
an immediate ideological judgment
so he shows he is merely a narrator,
someone who is telling this story.
The sense and conclusions
of the story are entrusted
to each individual viewer.
- Personally, I -
- It's a gesture of -.
I think I interpret it
as a gesture of modesty, humility,
and even a way
of admitting my limitations.
I'm a director.
I didn't tell this story
to frighten people, nor to preach,
because I am just a director.
See? The set is fake!
The witness can find salvation,
if he is a witness,
and in his role as a witness,
by drinking rhino milk.
I'm not here to advertise rhino milk,
which I don't think is even on the market.
I've been asked so many times
what the rhinoceros means.
People even stop me on the street and say,
"I liked the film,
but I didn't understand the rhinoceros."
I still haven't prepared a funny answer,
nor one that may solve
this distressing query.
We may say,
in maybe too irresponsibly
psychoanalytical a way,
that the protagonist, Orlando,
survives because
his good faith as a witness,
his good faith in recording good and evil,
right and wrong, life as it is,
is the attitude of someone
who is nourished
even by the monstrous aspects of life,
by its deformed and bestial aspects.
Indeed,
he claims that rhino milk is delicious.
It actually annoys me to translate it
into such heavily pedagogic terms,
but since it appeared to be an issue
for so many viewers,
I'd like to tell them,
"Try drinking rhino milk,
and you'll see your boat won't sink.
It'll miraculously stay afloat,
thanks to this acceptance of obscure
and irrational aspects of yourselves."
- We'd like to thank you. I'm grateful.
- No, I thank you.
- Do you want to re-watch it now?
- What?
- The interview.
- Just a little.
Okay, let's watch it.
Don't talk. If this is a listening spot,
you should listen, not talk!
Can I please hear
what the dottore is saying?
FELLINI RACCONTA 2
DIARY OF A FILM
See? I have this whole hand movement
that's typical of Italians when speaking.
The dottore is speaking.
He's speaking. You're listening. Yes.
Next time -
You don't have to answer this,
you answer instead.
What's the next film you're doing?
- Do you know yet?
- We don't. We'd like -.
You weren't supposed to talk.
You're listening to me.
I'm just pretending to talk
so you can occasionally nod.
Dottore, can you say something?
- Me?
- Yes. Just move your arm and hand,
anyway your voice won't be audible here.
There you go.
I can move my leg too.
There you go, raise a leg!
It's a ballet!
WE APOLOGIZE TO THE AUDIENCE
FOR THE QUALITY OF SOME IMAGES
TAKEN FROM CUT OR UNRELEASED MATERIAL
DUE TO DEFECTS IN THE ORIGINAL VIDEOS