Federico Fellini's cinema spectacle: Ginger e Fred

My professor opened this Modern Film class quoting "Fellini did good work, and great work." In case you're already a step behind that means he never did bad work. How can he, when his favorite hero is the sexy Marcello Mastroianni... at least in the 60's. This film doesn't quite show his machismo - it's filmed almost 25 years after 8 1/2.

Fellini cleverly takes a good 20 minutes to introduce his character "Pippo" and does so requiring of his audience a similar reaction to opening a jar of sauce and finding mold inside. I can't even spell the word for it, but "Ew!" is close enough.

For a quick overview of the lead roles – more than 40 years after the height of their fame, Amelia (Fellini's wife) and Pippo (Marcello Mastroianni) are brought out of retirement to reprise their ballroom dance act, ''Ginger and Fred,'' on a television variety show called ''We Are Proud to Present.''

Their characters have taken separate paths since they've last performed together, Amelia is now the pragmatic, sprucely dressed widow who's agreed to come out of retirement to please her grandchildren, and Pippo is a boozy, over-the-hill womanizer who needs the money.

The movie almost becomes 2 films – one highlighting the more "innocent" world of vaudeville and the relationship that was, and could have been, between two entertainers that are pitted against a circus-style modern medium of television. Herein lies the "second" film – a chaotic world of simply bad tv, tacky entertainers and 15-minute-famers who wander around backstage for quite a long period of the movie in an almost purgatory trance. Fellini makes sure their appearance on the variety show does not redeem them. Well maybe with the exception of the profound monk and the tango midget dancers.

I doubt this write-up is encouraging you to run out and watch this. I am a fan of Fellini. I even named one of my cats Fellini (couldn't resist). But with many of his works, it's almost more fun to talk about them. Dreams. Dreamscapes (in this case a motorcycle scene outside a club). Midgets. Circus sounds.  

Ah the sounds. He was a master. In this movie I'd have to say my favorite sound design was the scene with no sound. He uses light (actually, lack thereof) to encapsulate a private whisper - Pippo begging Amelia to run away off stage in the course of a electrical black out. 

He also uses repetition - Ameila saying the name "Pippo" over a hundred times - asking for him, calling him, talking about him. Reminded me of the repetition in 8 1/2 – people calling for the name "Guido! Guido!" So now I'm back to where I started, and I'll end with the lovely mental visual of the 1963 Marcello Mastroianni.