Review of La Dolce Vita

Great artists are like prophets whether they mean it or not. Think of H G Wells and Ray Bradbury or Paddy Chayesfski for that matter. Here Federico Fellini warns us about the disenchantment of plenty. So, at the end, this scandalous film of 1960 is a morality tale. Marcello Mastroianni is superb, a beautiful exterior with an interior that is dying, slowly but surely. The term "paparazzo" was coined in this film. The hunters of the banal grew in numbers over the years but not in scope, Anita Ekberg became a symbol of the sixties and who was she? A fantasy, impossible to reach. Real is his wife, the splendid Yvonne Fourneaux. Real is his father, played with heart breaking resignation by Annibale Ninchi or the suicide of his close friend, the intellectual played by Alain Cuny. La Dolce Vita is almost 58 years old and I imagine that the its message, like in most art, will live forever.