Anniversary of La Dolce Vita

 On February 3, 1960, in Rome, the premiere of the film La Dolce Vita by Federico Fellini.

The film was awarded 11 film awards and 12 nominations, including the prestigious Palme d'Or of the Cannes International Film Festival and the David di Donatello Prize, as well as Oscar nominations for best directing and the British BAFTA Award for Best Film. That year, Fellini lost the Oscar to the creators of the film West Side Story, Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins (of course: the Americans!). And the BAFTA Award Fellini then lost to Billy Wilder, who was awarded for the film "Apartment". A very worthy competitor!

The most respected film critics praised the film extremely highly. Roger Ebert gave the film a maximum of 4 stars and included it in his list of "Greatest Films." Bosley Crowther from he New York Times named movie "an awesome picture, licentious in content but moral and vastly sophisticated in its attitude and what it says." - The New York Times, 20 April 1961

It is noteworthy that the film earned the praise of film critics not only at the days of its release on the screens, but also after decades - in the 21st century. So, the Russian film critic Yevgeny Nefyodov wrote in his review of the film: “Giving bright hope and faith in a person, La Dolce Vita is inseparable from the important socio-historical period, remaining a work truly alive, not subject to aging and still conquering sweetness, which the delicate aftertaste of the bitter protects from sweetness." 

According to Sergei Kudryavtsev, "this movie ... should be regarded as a modern philosophical fresco about Italian society, which experienced in the very end of the 50s an "economic miracle" after several years of poverty, has clearly stabilized, acquiring all the features of a typical "consumer society". Fellini wanted, first of all, to show how careless, empty and meaningless life is in which loneliness, alienation and separation of people reign .... With its outward simplicity and clarity, La Dolce Vita was first struck by the baroque directorial vision, with the falsity of the composition, the symbolism of the prologue and the poetic finale - one of the sophisticated and inexplicably exciting lyrical scenes in the history of world cinema." 

However, one should not think that Fellini's film was enthusiastically praised by everyone and everywhere. The pro-fascist regimes of Franco in Spain and Salazar in Portugal banned the screening of the film in their countries. And this ban lasted until the death of dictators. In Italy itself, the government of Fernando Tambroni, which came to power a month after the premiere of the film, also banned the screening of the film. However, this government only remembered that it dispersed communist demonstrations, banned the La Dolce Vita and remained in power for 4 months (!) only. After Tambroni resigned in July 1960, the Fellini's film returned to the screens of Italian cinemas again.

In fairness, it should be noted that, as in Spain and Portugal with their pro-fascist regimes, in the Soviet Union, La Dolce Vita was also not shown in movie theaters.

And in another country more the film was banned - in the Vatican. According to Yevgeny Nefedov, who has already been mentioned, "representatives of Catholic circles, including Vatican officials, condemned Fellini's bold allusions to the commercialization of the Church, which is mired in the all-pervading vanity of vanities. But instead of waiting for the Second coming (introductory footage with the transportation by helicopter of the Jesus Christ statue over Rome) and the hypocritical worship of the supposed appearance of the Virgin, the author calls as the curtain pastoralists brilliant work, marvel at the genuine, earthly, miraculous miracle, the smile and soul were pure angelic girl."

However, as it turns out, Pro-fascist political views or increased religiosity are not always the only reasons for a negative attitude to this masterpiece of Fellini. On the site Kinopoisk I found several reviews, very sharply criticizing this film. Mainly for the lack of plot and the resulting incomprehensibility. And, characteristically, the age of all authors of such reviews is from 20 to 30 years. That is, once again, we can say that a generation has grown up, for representatives of which films that are a little more complicated than Pledge This! or movie opuses with Jason Statham's participation are beyond understanding. Thank God that at least they can put letters into words. True, and even this, often with errors. For this, a special thank you to the "party and government", which had reduced the country's education system to a pygmy level over the past 2-3 decades.

And nevertheless the "detractors" of Fellini's masterpiece are in an "overwhelming minority". Almost 70% of IMDB and Kinopoisk users gave this film a rating of 8 or higher.

Taking into account the above indicators of success of the film La Dolce Vita, its rating according to FilmGourmand is 8.592 and it occupies the 284th Rank in the Golden Thousand.