FELLINI: SPECTACULAR OBSESSIONS at the TIFF Bell Lightbox (350 King West), to September 18. $12, stu/srs $9.25. 416-599-8433. See listing Rating: NNNN
How to encapsulate a director like Federico Fellini? This giant of 20th century cinema had an enormous range of interests and appetites. This exhibit succeeds in charting the many facets of a director as enigmatic as he was excessive, from his early days as a pioneer of Italian neo-realism to his mature, dreamlike style.
Exhibition curators Barr Gilmore and Laurel MacMillan build the exhibit around a recreation of Rome’s Via Veneto, the epicentre of a sizzling celebrity culture that emerged in the late 50s. A room is devoted to largely unknown early photographer Marcello Geppetti, who invented the on-the-scene celebrity snapshot and inspired La Dolce Vita character Paparazzo, who gave his name to the profession. There is also ample footage and photographs of Anita Ekberg, the Swedish bombshell immortalized by Fellini in La Dolce Vita.
Video and archival interviews document Fellini’s famous casting process through open calls that allowed aspiring actors and extras to walk in off the street. Anyone wondering how he found La Volpina, the iconic sexual aggressor in Amarcord, can find out here. The show also sheds light on his long relationship with cinematic alter ego Marcello Mastroianni.
Fellini’s obsession with early rock ‘n’ roll and the circus are highlighted, and his strained relationship with the Catholic Church is illustrated by his infamous Vatican fashion show from the movie Roma, one of his most deliciously absurd pieces of satire.
A room is devoted to his dream journals. Impressed by the work of Carl Jung, Fellini was encouraged by Jungian psychoanalyst Ernst Bernhard to write down and illustrate his dreams, which he did with his usual gusto, filling over 350 pages with scenarios, most of them brimming with enormous women. His narratives, however, do also include moments of keen, self-deprecating insight.
The Fellini who emerges from the show is a joyous and self-indulgent man-child, enormously talented and driven, who ultimately comes across as generous and wise.
art@nowtoronto.com
