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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