Reviews

I don't know what it is about Fellini. I love watching movies and have seen many in time, and appreciate deep, thoughtful movies, be them foreign or independent releases. But with Fellini - I just can't see what all the fuss is about. This is the sixth Fellini film I have seen and each one has fallen short of the mark (two of them I switched off before the end). La Dolce Vita is no exception. I really tried to like this, and the first hour seemed fairly interesting but ultimately it went nowhere. Fellini could have told the same story in half the time instead of 3 hours.

I get the impression that Fellini is a very self-indulgent film maker, which I consider to be selfish. What about those that watch and pay to see your movies? Making movies for your own satisfaction is one thing, but this goes beyond self-indulgence. This is not as big a piece of crap as Satyricon - that one came out of my VCR after 30 minutes (and that was 30 minutes too long). I would avoid this. By the way I gave it a 6/10, because for 1960 it was ahead of its time.

This is such a wonderful film. I saw it originally about 2 years ago when I was living in England on cable, and back then I thought it was quite good, but this time round I enjoyed it even more. From the same director that bought us the Oscar winning Cinema Paradiso, The Star Maker is a story of a con man that travels around Sicily giving false hope to everyday folk telling them they could be the next big star of the movies for a small screen test fee. I won't bother saying any more on what it is about as I highly recommend you rent or buy this movie. Many critics say that Cinema Paradiso is the better film but I disagree. This is my favourite film by Tornatore out of the three of his movies I have seen so far. "Stanno Tutti Bene" is also worth a look as well as "Cinema Paradiso" but this is more superior to both.

One of my favourite foreign films of all time...I don't know how it didn't win the Academy Award for Best Foreign film. Rating - 9/10.

I admit that I had to turn this off after an hour. The only good bit up to that point was a one minute scene with Woody Allen which had me in hysterics (Woody is the only reason I rented this). If I had known there was no more Woody Allen appearances forthcoming I would have switched it off sooner.

Avoid and be wise with your time!!!