Matcollis This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

AboveDeepBuggy Some things I liked some I did not.

Konterr Brilliant and touching

Skyler Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

blanche-2 Marcello Mastroianni and Giulietta Masina star in "Ginger and Fred" from 1986, directed by Federico Fellini.Amelia and Pippo once had a successful act imitating Fred and Ginger. Thirty years after their act, they are asked to dance in a special Christmas show for TV called "We Are Proud To Present."It's a real freak show with the most bizarre acts you've ever seen, including a priest who left the priesthood and is now engaged, a man of the cloth who can levitate himself, lookalikes - some very strange acts.Amelia and Pippo not only danced together but were involved. However Amelia married, had a daughter and is now widowed. Pippo married as well.Amelia is worried that Pippo isn't up to the dancing, and when the power goes out in the theater, the two consider bolting.Bittersweet film with marvelous acting and real chemistry between the two.Masina was married to Fellini and died five months after he did.

federovsky The later, nostalgic Fellini is always worth another look. How I want to like this more, a touching last adventure, albeit too late, that revives the old glories, ties up old emotions - a last irresistible chance to live. There's genius in the choice of subject: a couple of old dancing stars (Fellini favourites Mastroianni and Masina) have been invited to recreate their old act on a manic TV show. They prepare themselves physically and emotionally for this reunion, the last chance to tread the boards and feel the glory. This is Fellini - and his stars - well into old age, poised on the edge of oblivion, having got used, presumably, to irrelevancy, and now able to reflect wistfully on it all - even able to say a kind of goodbye. The homage to Astaire and Rogers is also a homage to cinema, and the idea of showing those old values displaced in the new tacky world of television is a fine ruse.Ginger (Masina) is immediately lost in this mad new world exactly as if she has stepped out of an old film. Outrageous advertising, rubbish piled in the streets, gangs of youths on motorbikes, the uncertainty of where they are being taken and what will happen to them - all nicely encapsulate the disorientation. The unstoppable madness of real life, it seems, is more Felliniesque than Fellini. When Mastroianni finally appears - after some anticipation - he is a sorry wreck of his former self. This is quite touching. They go over their old routine, feel the nerves once again, meet some old friends, get that sense of achievement for the last time.But what a hash Fellini makes of it, what a laborious rendering. It's a raucous gabble - treacle-think with yattering people who are really more irritating than cute. Yes, that's the theme: gentle nostalgia swamped by the manic, garish, loud, unstoppable modern world. But still, there had to be a subtler way of presenting an irritating world than irritating the audience. And let's be honest, this is his usual style. As usual, there are too many words in the script; there is barely a moment's rest from the breathless dialogue - most of it not as funny or quaint as it tries to be. It's never the words that raise a smile, but the silent moments that bring most out of the characters. If only Fellini had realised that.The inventiveness is desperate, and is only sporadically funny, nostalgic, or touching. Largely it seems like an excuse to parade a variety of freakish or eccentric characters, cramming in far too many of them. Group scenes are invariably chaotic and lack the precision and clarity of the old days, when black and white forced a more precise delineation of scene and character. What it lacks in crispness it tries to makes up for in sheer sensory experience, but it feels slapdash, and that feel is compounded, as always, by that terrible Cinecitta dubbing. This is not nearly the worst example, but it does appear slapped on at times like a veneer. Quite clearly the words they are mouthing are not the ones you hear; it is maddening and sometimes difficult to see who is talking from a distance, and, more importantly, it robs the serious characters of sincerity, and makes the flippant characters into cartoons. Some might take it as an element of style, a deliberately imposed artificiality implying that the characters are always bigger than their words - that's being overly indulgent.But it's hard to be too harsh. On the plus side, there is a fine arc to this film; it grows in meaning, matures, and finally blossoms into a delicate flower of nostalgia. There's great music, and the two stars, who are, you can tell, by nature wistful and gentle - that's enough. And I'm a big fan of railway station endings, having spent so long - whole nights often enough - enduring the loneliness of the long-distance traveller, even in Roma Termini the year this film was made. Everyone is benign - even the murderous mafia boss in handcuffs. Everyone has a beneficial role to play in society, a performance to make, no matter how freakish they are, how out of touch or out of date. Sure, the present makes a mockery of the past, but no more than the past, with more justification, makes a mockery of the present.I'm surprised I like Fellini. He's never critical of anything, no matter how stupid or weird, whereas I'm critical of everything, especially things human. He has no interest in the natural world, only in people, whereas I see everything, especially the human world, in the context of a bigger picture- nature - in which humans are just a few billion scurrying ants. So Fellini represents all the stuff that I have lost, or never gained - the side of me that got concreted over somewhere along the way; he is the antidote to misanthropy and ill-feeling of any sort, to all the misery that society, as a necessary by-product, tips upon itself; he is the little man getting his own back without bitterness. In short, he's good for the soul. Just a pity the producer or other person of influence didn't rein in much of the extraneous garishness (including the smutty jokes) here.People love the humanity in this film and will be prepared to overlook the directorial misjudgements. Fine. It must be nice to be so generous, but, in all honesty, from a filmcraft point of view, this could have been much better.

Marcin Kukuczka Though we had various Fellini movies from the touching sweetness in LO SCEICCO BIANCO, the touching drama in LA STRADA through purely psychoanalytical realities in GIULIETTA DEGLI SPIRITI or CITY OF WOMEN to the autobiographical uniqueness in OTTO E MEZZO, this film appears to be a unique phenomenon. More to say, when you decide to see GINGER E FRED, you do not notice nor feel the Felliniesque nature so much but something different. What is it that one notices? (you may reflect) A sort of return to past memories...? Just a simple story...? Another movie within the four walls of a psyche...? Is it, perhaps, a sentiment brought to tears? No, since Fellini never jerked fake tears...GINGER E FRED is a wonderful film about a moment in the fading career of a couple whose dance once proved a smashing success and who see each other again after all these years just to show their 'pearl' to the young generation. Although it is no longer a heyday of their career, Pippo (Marcello Mastroianni) and Amelia (Giulietta Masina) decide to come to Rome to perform their dance. Yet, the both soon realize that this is not the Rome they knew and loved. The problem does not lie in the changed streets, transformed centres and more vehicles but in the generation they will have to deal with this time. There are lots of noises with flashes, mayors with their doubles and cameras all around and everything surrounded by the fake glamour of commercial Christmas and loud 'Buon Natale' wishes with kisses...all for the sake of a strange monster that such crowds dedicated their lives to...TELEVISION. Here lies the core gist... Will 'TV robots' and 'sensation consumers' be able to find the couple's dance worthy noticing? Fellini's film is truly a satire on TV generation, on the people who cannot imagine living without it and whom he really ridicules. Through many moments of wit, including VIPs' visits, interviews, chaos of TV shows, shallow effects, fake mysticism, lack of art, pseudo careers, talks of plastic surgeries and many others, he seems to draw our attention to the fact what strange social phenomenon it is and, moreover, what impact it has on society, on blinded crowds. It is important to mention that he sometimes becomes too cynical through exaggeration, particularly in case of a priest and miracles ridiculed at a show. It is true that Fellini was critical of the Church and no one should skip that aspect not to make viewers confused. In case of Church, one may reject his view thoroughly. Yet, his points about sheer chaos of TV shows appear to be particularly accurate.Who speaks on Fellini's behalf is, again, wonderful Italian actor Marcello Mastroianni. He portrays Pippo who cannot find himself in this weird unjust reality, who sneers weak artists who "p**s to bed," who doubts the sudden career of mayor's daughter, who understands the codes of conversation unknown to simple "Boffoni". Although it is in no way an action movie and lots of moments may occur tedious and chaotic in the long run, you realize the feelings of Pippo whilst deeper analysis, trying to identify with him, with his thoughts and disappointment. You as a viewer are with him. Pippo is contrasted to all the rest, like Giulietta in GIULIETTA DEGLI SPIRITI. His world is no longer popular because nobody really knows it.The performances are brilliant but this applies to the two: Marcello Mastroianni and Giulietta Masina. Their presence adds much genuineness to the characters since they both could identify their roles with the very moments of their lives (1986). It is, in this respect, a sort of Fellini's tribute to the two but, at the same time, his determined cry in the declining art the director condemns television for. Moreover, he also seems to blame TV for depriving people of something more ambitious and entertaining, for creating a monstrous reality of noise that carries no meaning just sheer mumbling. But let me say something about the couple's performances.You as a viewer are almost all the time with them. They constitute the 'oasis of normality' in the whole 'madness' around. They are perfect as entertainers, as dramatists; finally as dancers. Their very best moments include the rehearsal filled with the sentiments of the past, a funny scene in the bus when a recording says quietly yet powerfully 'Pippo'... and the quintessential of the movie, their dance. Here, Fellini truly identifies with Mastroianni as he did in OTTO E MEZZO giving him the lead and shows the greatest respect for his wife Giulietta Masina. Here, she is excellent in a different way than she was years earlier in LA STRADA, LE NOTTI DI CABIRIA or GIULIETTA DEGLI SPIRITI, yet equally adorable as THE Woman of Cinema.Remember, in order to see this film, you don't have to know Fellini, his particular style executed foremost in the 1960s and 1970s. Knowing TV shows will suffice for you to laugh, to criticize, to mock and to identify with the famous Italian director. Fellini's criticism appears to be constructive as well as he seems to say to all of us: "Turn off your TV this time and give up listening to voices of meaningless entertainment. Tonight, you will listen to my voice" Can we refuse? NO, for the sake of Marcello and, foremost, for the sake of Giulietta!!!

nihilistdude2000 This wasn't a bad film, though those without previous knowledge of Fellini's films may not like it as much. Giuletta Masina and Marcello Mastroani give their usual great performances. I actually thought Marcello gave one of his better performances here, in that he displayed a great comedic timing. I am mostly familiar with Fellini's pre-1970 films so I was not sure how a film made in the 1980's would do (given how much cinema had changed from the 50's/60's to the 80's), but he still delivers an enjoyable film, thanks in large part to good acting by the two leads. I enjoyed the satirical attack on television and the modern era (advertisting, etc.), which I happen to strongly agree with. The TV show scene near the end contains your typical Fellini "magic" and aesthetics, so I enjoyed that as well. This is by no means comparable to Fellini's masterpieces, but is still a well-made and enjoyable film, and more accessible than some of his more outrageous stuff he's made in past years. 7/10.