I Clowns (PG)
Directed by Federico Fellini.
1970. 93 mins. Released by Eureka! as part of their Masters Of Cinema series.
When was the moment that the whole world turned on clowns? It's the kind of paradigm shift which would usually take hold gradually over a generation or so but the reputation of clowning seemed to collapse as quickly and unexpectedly as the Berlin Wall. One minute clowns were an accepted part of the culture; the next everybody claimed to hate them and find them creepy and have had nightmares about them as a child.
Which makes selling a film all about them, even one by Fellini, a difficult proposition. Presumably the shift can't have been prior to 1970 when this made-for-TV faux documentary celebration of them was put together, though even here the tone is wistful and nostalgic, a lament for the bygone age of circuses.
The film opens with a recreation of Fellini's first trip to the circus when he was little boy and ends with an extended fantasy slapstick circus ring funeral, a death masque of the white clowns. Between that is an hour of fake documentary footage in which the real Fellini leads a pretend film crew travelling around Italy and France to interview the great clowns of the twentieth century, hearing expert Tristan Remy pontificate on the issue of clowning and visiting some of the major circuses of that time. This footage is shot in a flat TV style. Mixed in with it are recreations of classic circus acts performed by contemporary clowns.
Needless to say, very little of this is funny. Fellini's has some meta-fun with the antics of his pretend film crew, having his mini-skirted assistant read to camera the introduction to each clown just as they are arriving and setting up for the interview. Actual laughs though are rare. Perhaps the big joke is how this documentary reveals absolutely nothing. The film makes a big fuss of the people they are meeting and the rigmarole of travelling around to do the interviews but then never listens to what they have to say.
It all seems terribly pointless. The whole film can be summed up by the sequence in the French TV centre where they have gone to see some rare footage of the greatest clown Rhum. They film themselves walking down the corridor, passing surly French TV staff, looking out the window at the ugly block of the French State TV building but when they finally get to see the footage, Rhum is only in it for a few seconds.
When this was made Fellini was coming off the defining decade of his career. In the fifties, he had been an integral and lauded member of the Italian neo-realist but starting with La Dolce Vita in 1960 he had transformed himself into a surreal exhibitionist, a creator of arthouse spectacle, a big-top Bergman. The big top appears in a number of his films and the idea of life as a big circus ring is more or less constant. I can't recall another film maker who made a feature length documentary about his own defining visual metaphor.
Extras
Fellini's Circus a 42 minute essay by Adriano Apra with some background information on its making and some analysis, some of it via the medium of pie charts and graphs. It relies quite heavily on an essay Fellini wrote about the film which appeared in the book that accompanied the film's release.
8 and a half review
Fellini Roma review
Directed by Federico Fellini.
1970. 93 mins. Released by Eureka! as part of their Masters Of Cinema series.
When was the moment that the whole world turned on clowns? It's the kind of paradigm shift which would usually take hold gradually over a generation or so but the reputation of clowning seemed to collapse as quickly and unexpectedly as the Berlin Wall. One minute clowns were an accepted part of the culture; the next everybody claimed to hate them and find them creepy and have had nightmares about them as a child.
Which makes selling a film all about them, even one by Fellini, a difficult proposition. Presumably the shift can't have been prior to 1970 when this made-for-TV faux documentary celebration of them was put together, though even here the tone is wistful and nostalgic, a lament for the bygone age of circuses.
The film opens with a recreation of Fellini's first trip to the circus when he was little boy and ends with an extended fantasy slapstick circus ring funeral, a death masque of the white clowns. Between that is an hour of fake documentary footage in which the real Fellini leads a pretend film crew travelling around Italy and France to interview the great clowns of the twentieth century, hearing expert Tristan Remy pontificate on the issue of clowning and visiting some of the major circuses of that time. This footage is shot in a flat TV style. Mixed in with it are recreations of classic circus acts performed by contemporary clowns.
Needless to say, very little of this is funny. Fellini's has some meta-fun with the antics of his pretend film crew, having his mini-skirted assistant read to camera the introduction to each clown just as they are arriving and setting up for the interview. Actual laughs though are rare. Perhaps the big joke is how this documentary reveals absolutely nothing. The film makes a big fuss of the people they are meeting and the rigmarole of travelling around to do the interviews but then never listens to what they have to say.
It all seems terribly pointless. The whole film can be summed up by the sequence in the French TV centre where they have gone to see some rare footage of the greatest clown Rhum. They film themselves walking down the corridor, passing surly French TV staff, looking out the window at the ugly block of the French State TV building but when they finally get to see the footage, Rhum is only in it for a few seconds.
When this was made Fellini was coming off the defining decade of his career. In the fifties, he had been an integral and lauded member of the Italian neo-realist but starting with La Dolce Vita in 1960 he had transformed himself into a surreal exhibitionist, a creator of arthouse spectacle, a big-top Bergman. The big top appears in a number of his films and the idea of life as a big circus ring is more or less constant. I can't recall another film maker who made a feature length documentary about his own defining visual metaphor.
Extras
Fellini's Circus a 42 minute essay by Adriano Apra with some background information on its making and some analysis, some of it via the medium of pie charts and graphs. It relies quite heavily on an essay Fellini wrote about the film which appeared in the book that accompanied the film's release.
8 and a half review
Fellini Roma review
