8½ (1963)

the audience applauded

So much average

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Federico Fellini gets Marcello Mastroianni to play him. Yes. Right? Of course. The artistic block is something that Fellini dealt with all his life - Orson Welles once said that Fellini was a great artist with very little to say - that's part of Mastroianni/Fellini's block - He knows where he wants to go but he doesn't know if he has what it takes to get there - then of course the the distractions or excuses whatever you prefer, they are muses, mothers, loves, wives. I was overwhelmed by the access Fellini provides to his own heart and mind and by the audacity and poetry of the film. 8 1/2 stands alone in the virtual mausoleum of world cinema.

This is not a bad movie, and nor is a 6/10 a harsh rating. Yeah, to me it's not a perfect 10/10 or really close to it. I didn't dislike this movie, I just felt indifferent to it. There is more good than bad though, so that's always nice! The best thing about this movie is some of its iconic shots, such as the opening dream sequence or the final scene. I liked how this director is having a hard time mixing reality and memories, a creative plot. But overall I was just bored.

I have seen this movie more times than I can count. Even the first time I saw it I was struck by Fellini's masterful opening scene and the use of sound & silence. The movie is clever, funny, and poignant. Definitely worth watching.

Colossal artist thinking about the futility of efforts to create a masterpiece. Why do you need to say something when you can not be understood though you put it clearly? Shouldn't you reject even the smallest attempts to create something compromised that would not be an ideal, measure, which requires society?The main problem of the hero is the fear of the possibility of failure, natural for everyone who ever trod the stage, sat down in above the paper, or picked up a brush (except crazy daredevils, of course, that take their indiscrimination and human ignorance as their own talent). And the attempt to kill his internal critic revolves expected failure.Finding inspiration and insight within itself distinguishes this picture from the previous Fellini's giant "La Dolce Vita" where the hero finds his salvation in women, luxury and pleasure. In "8?" women also have a crucial role, as the film demonstrates blatant sexuality and the result of a child's sexual complexes. Only here they play a role of a barriers, which the hero can not get rid of. He understands and knows what the problem is even he says that he wants to leave everything for the sake of art, but he is not ready.The artistic value of the Fellini's film is hard to overemphasize. The philosophical content, which even on the tenth revision will give you new ideas and thoughts, and unmatched picture, like in a museum of fine art, fascinate. First ragged thread of the narrative seems a kaleidoscope of disconnected scenes and canvases. Thoughts wander, it is difficult to capture the essence. Some times it seems like you are in a more emotional version of Bergman's film. But gradually the feelings of the main character string all that happens on a single core, form such kind of narrative, the other here seems inappropriate, inadequate, that could not explain anything. Therein lies the main paradox of the film, fruitless pursuit of the ideal which leads hero to despair, gives Fellini this ideal.