MovieChat Forums > La dolce vita (1961) Discussion > The sequence with the father...

The sequence with the father...

posted 14 years ago by gustavocec
6 replies | jump to latest

...couldn't find any discussion of this sequence in La Dolce Vita board. What do you think of it? Is the character a counterpoint to the professor's character? I had the feeling the father sequence was more fantasy than other sequences. Similar to the meeting with the girl at the beach restaurant (that Marcello finds again at the end of the movie), the reunion with the father may be a symbol of an idealized past in the small town, pure and far from the cool, snob life in the big city.
I have a feeling this part is very important in the film but I can't quite get it. Any ideas?
I think La Dolce Vita is brilliant, by the way. I saw it again (after seeing it several times over the last three decades) and it saddened me to think nowadays it's difficult to find such outstanding movies.
(Sorry for my poor English!)

[–] Umberto-L 14 years ago

I must have read on Fellini's biography (written by Tullio Kezich) that Fellini liked a lot Annibale Ninchi (who plays Marcello's father here and Guido's father in "8 1/2") because he had always seen a father figure in him. If you also consider that Fellini's films are massively autobiographic (Marcello's way of life represents an idealized version of Federico's early life in Rome as a newspaperman), then I agree with you on seeing the father as a symbol of the good old provincial life (if you are Italian you'll notice that Ninchi has an accent very close to the Riminese).

[–] Suskis 12 years ago

Marcello is supposed to be from Cesena, so it's obvious his father has a "romagnolo" accent (Rimini is in Romagna, too).

'What has been affirmed without proof can also be denied without proof.' (Euclid)

[–] kaskait 14 years ago

Marcello wanted to be his father. His father was a businessman always away on trips, seemingly living the good life. So that was Marcello did, he is always away, always being carefree with his jetsetting job. But he has since discovered that he isn't like his father at all. In fact he wants a family life, which is why he envies his friend so much...the family man.

Marcello's father also represents mortality. Marcello is desperate to make some kind of connection with his father before it is too late. Even after the party and the near heart attack scare, there is no connection between father and son. They are like strangers to one another.

The film is a mythological allegory, a trip to Hades or a journey into the Minotaur's labyrinth. Marcello loses everything he holds dear, every hope and dream. At the end he is a ghost and the film contrasts his death with the girl's aliveness.

[–] telmalex 14 years ago

Very good point by Kaskait, i only want to add, that at some points his father seems to start enjoying that kind of life (when he goes to the girl0s house), but suddenly he realizes what his doing and quickly wants to catch the first train to return to his village and his real life. He wants to run away has fast has he can from that empty life. At that point Marcello can't understand him anymore....

[–] nickrogers1969 13 years ago

Thank you all for the good explanations.
I was wondering about those scenes with the father and now I understand them better.

[–] DeclanCochran 12 years ago

I've only just finished watching the film and need to seriously collect my thoughts (and also, probably, rewatch it), but I took the father to be reflective of Marcello's isolation; the absent father, leaving Marcello, leaving him with nobody and clutching at straws, looking for some kind of connection; the connection that he fills with women and excess, emptily, which ultimately leads him to be completely alone. That's just my take on it, it's probably very basic compared to some other interpretations.

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"A man who does not spend time with his family can never be a real man."