La Dolce Vita (The Sweet Life) [1960]

Very few filmmakers apart from Charlie Chaplin have been fortunate to have had their names turned into an adjectives to describe their respective style and/or school of filmmaking. Federico Fellini was one, and consequently La Dolce Vita, considered along with 8 ½ as one of the two greatest masterpieces of the Italian maestro, can only mostly aptly be defined by the epithet Felliniesque. The movie is an astringent portrayal of the rabid celebrity-obsession and fixation that has come to define “modern” society, littered with paparazzo, yellow journalism, hedonism and an overall shallowness. In one of the most widely recognized onscreen performances, Marcello Mastrioanni starred as a bohemian gossip journalist and wannabe litterateur, who spends his days and nights swamped with bored socialites and hookers at various parties and nightclubs. And the ennui, lack of emotional involvement and spiritual dissatisfaction of our picaresque hero form the perfect mirror for the decadence, desolation and debauchery that the Rome he wanders through is perpetually filled with. His boisterous tryst with a beautiful and voluptuous but intellectually vacuous actress (played with carefree abandon by Anita Ekberg) at a Roman fountain remains one of the most iconic movie moments. Shot in glorious black-and-whites, the movie’s circus-like depiction of life’s excess and the emptiness therein made this a landmark European arthouse movie with few equals.





Director: Federico Fellini
Genre: Comedy/Social Satire/Media Satire/Urban Comedy
Language: Italian
Country: Italy