Federico Fellini's Il Bidone / The Swindlers (1955) features Americans Broderick Crawford and Richard Basehart plus a slew of Italians, including Giulietta Masina and Franco Fabrizi. It shifts gears throughout. Sometimes it's mordantly amusing (the way certain grifters pull the wool over their targets' eyes), sometimes unsettling, sometimes sad or tragic, sometimes exuberant. Hey, it's Fellini in black and white!
The ensemble actors work well together. Certain other things stand out. One, these swindlers take advantage of down and out people, mostly poor and desperate in the wake of World War II. Two, the wealthier people, even ones who started their careers as swindlers, are protective of their situation and the (new) status quo. Three, television is starting to make a splash in early 1950s Italy. At a raucous New Year's Eve party, the host insists on watching the New Year come in on TV -- as has become traditional ever since. Real people celebrate in a room while watching, some of them, ghostly shimmering figures of other people celebrating on the tube. Only then, I suppose, it still seemed weird so to do.
Overall, Il Bidone shows nimble Fellini touches that have an artistic lineage. There's a feel for human nature not unlike parts of Decamerone di Giovanni Boccaccio. Cognominato Principe Galeotto and Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, for example. I dig.
Today's Rune: Protection.
1 comment:
I don't know when the last time is I watched a black and white film. been ages.
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