Juliet of the Spirits
by Federico Fellini
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Product details
Actor: Giulietta Masina, Mario Pisu, Sandra Milo, Valentina Cortese, Valeska GertDirector: Federico Fellini
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: Italian (Original Language), Analog
Format: NTSC
Publisher: Image Entertainment
Studio: Image Entertainment
VHS Movie Reviews of Juliet of the Spirits
Movie Review: Solid
Summary: 3 Stars
Federico Fellini's first color film, 1965's Juliet Of The Spirits (Giulietta Degli Spiriti), which was written by Fellini and longtime collaborators Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, and Brunello Rondi, is, simply put, the female and color companion piece to 8?. Unlike that prior film, often considered Fellini's best, Juliet Of The Spirits was a critical and financial failure when it came out. The criticism of the film was too harsh for, while it is not as great nor good a film as some earlier Fellini classics, it is still Fellini, which makes it better than the overwhelming majority of films by others, for even when Fellini fails he succeeds at more things than most. However, like many of the first color films made by directors who started in black and white, Fellini seems to overdose on the new medium, with color schemes that seem off the charts, and which tend to bleed over into one another. However, given the oneiric quality of the film, this is not necessarily a bad thing, especially since this was at the start of 1960s psychadelia, and Fellini was supposedly affected by an LSD hit at the time.
Basically, Juliet Boldrini (Giulietta Masina- Fellini's real life wife) is a bored housewife who rightly suspects her wealthy public relations husband Giorgio (Mario Pisu) of infidelity, after their anniversary, when he mumbles another woman's name- Gabriella, a 24 year old model he's squiring around. Whereas the film, before this scene, was realist in the way that much of La Dolce Vita was, the seeds of doubt that are planted play havoc with Juliet's mind, and much of the rest of the film takes place entirely in Juliet's head. Even seemingly realistic scenes, such as when Juliet hires a detective agency to follow Giorgio and Gabriella, are tinged with psychodrama and images of repression, which make the viewer question if they are `real' in the film's cosmos, or merely the fantasies of Juliet trying to nail her cheating husband. Aside from her faithless husband, Juliet has other people's idiocies to contend with- such as a neighbor, Suzy (Sandra Milo), who is an old nymphomaniac who may or may not hold orgies- this is never certain, for this may be a product of Juliet's imagination, in her palatial home. There is also her attraction to and influence by the occult- which stands in direct contravention to her character's beliefs in Nights Of Cabiria, where Cabiria mocks the believers in religion. Juliet also has a cold mother, a boorish sister, and repressed memories of a Roman Catholic childhood that have scarred her in some way- possibly involving sexual abuse from an older male relative, although this is also unclear since the symbolism of the scene that explicates this is not definitive, and is open to more than one interpretation. However, the implications of abuse seem clear, and the way Juliet reacts to sex throughout the film do seem, to a modern eye four decades down the pike, like a textbook case of post-traumatic stress disorder in reaction to sexual abuse.... Cinematographer Gianni di Venanzo seems to have been overwhelmed by the newness and use of color and spends too much of the film aping some of the distorted point of view shots that Ingmar Bergman's cinematographer Sven Nykvist perfected, only not as well as Nykvist. Even Nino Rota, Fellini's masterful musical composer, seems to be lost through most of this film where the film's visual images are often at emotional odds with Rota's score, which ranges from gorgeous classical music to atrocious jazz scats. Fortunately, despite her character's dourness, Masina again shines in this role, as she did in her earlier Fellini classics, La Strada (as Gelsomina) and Nights Of Cabiria (as Cabiria). Playing someone discomfited through the film is not an easy thing, yet never does the viewer think she is acting. While the screenplay may be overdone, Juliet's reactions to what is going about her are perfectly consistent with how a normal person would react to such bizarreness. This is quite a bit more than one can say with Woody Allen's dull re-imagining of this film, a quarter century later, with Mia Farrow as the titular Alice.
While Juliet Of The Spirits is not a masterpiece like Nights Of Cabiria nor La Dolce Vita, it is not a failure, and holds up much better than the similarly themed Robert Altman film from 1977, Three Women, where we get the mental breakdown of a single woman who fantasizes herself into the lives of two other women. Juliet never goes that far, yet the film is never as resonant as Ingmar Bergman's more brilliant film from the same year, Persona, in showing the inside out destruction of a mind, for Juliet never gives in, even as she is being targeted, it seems, for destruction from the outside in; and while that might make her a more admirable character than the pair of women from Persona, it does not make for as compelling a film. Juliet Of The Spirits is therefore a good and interesting film, one that will likely reveal a few hidden depths upon rewatch, despite its flaws, but it is not one for the pantheon. However, as a failure, and from a master, it is still leagues above many of the jewels in the crowns of lesser filmmakers. This is something about Juliet Of The Spirits that is perfectly appropriate.
Movie Review: A French-Suburban Fantasy
Summary: 5 Stars
This is my favorite Fellini film and I dissagree with most of the reviews which suggest it's not as complex or fulfilling as his earlier work; though, being an artist, I probably have a different perspective on it than most. First of all it's a very ironic film and I see it as a quietly dark comedy. This is Fellini playing with visions of 60's suburbia, the supernatural and sexual mores as seen through the eyes of a "proper" stay-a-home wife who is no longer satisfied with her limited role, especially in the face of her fillandering husband's neglegence.
Roger Ebert compaired this film, which he dedicated to his wife and the movie's star Giulliette Massino, to a husband who buys his wife the gift he really wants for himself. I find that view really annoying. This is a movie about a woman who is finding her strength and independance apart from her husband and stepping into a larger more spiritual world. To me it's as pure and lively a work of art as anything by Van Gogh or Monet. Even taken simply as a set piece it's worth seeing. The cinematography is stunning.
Movie Review: Trippy
Summary: 5 Stars
Not as powerful as several of his other films but Juliet has always been a fun watch for me. Arguably the weakest flimsiest plot of any Fellini movie and that's saying something. Even Satyricon and 8 1/2 have discernable plots that figure into the overall understanding of the film's intent or message. In Juliet a woman hallucinates about her suspicions about her husband and her childhood. That's it. That's the entire plot. Fellini might be trying to say something deep about loneliness, longing, disillusionment and betrayal but the message seems to be subordinate to the images in this case. It is as if Fellini had all of these bizarro images floating around in his head and needed some excuse, any excuse, to put them on celluoid for his first shot in color feature. Consequently, the viewer is treated to over two hours of loosely held together intriguing, beguiling, provocative, confusing, funny, fascinating and beautifully filmed images. I'd like to watch it high sometime.Movie Review: Accessible film about a Fantasy life transforming and informing reality.
Summary: 5 Stars
One of Fellini's most accessible films (his use of color really helps), he once again plays reality against an active fantasy life... fantasies that combine memory, fears, fleeting desires and the way we imagine the lives of others. For me, one of the things that makes a film 5 star is that it provides something that only film can provide, and this is it; while the presentation is very theatrical, this quick intercutting of time/memory/mood can only be done in film.
While the overall message is a very conservative (pre/anti-feminist) one of it's day, Fellini DOES liberate a woman's fantasy life, and this is the essence of his leading "little woman." The predominant action of the film is in her imagination.
This was the day when middle/upper class Italian women did not work, and Masina represents the "good little woman." Rich enough to have servants, there was little to occupy her time or mind, other than similar friends who have veered to the outre and wierd just to have something to do. Masina's character searches more internally, and her fantasies color her vision of the lives of others. (Note that her usual circle of friends are equated with a fantasy of death, and you'll be clued into her psyche as these begin.)
I think you have to have lived a bit to "get" Fellini - I didn't like his work when I was younger - I love this. Also note his use of color as "percieved color" not literal color and this is worth many viewings.
And finally, if you are a larger woman... nothing makes you feel so great about being a large woman as watching Fellini's glorious Amazons!
Movie Review: My favorite film
Summary: 5 Stars
This was the first Fellini film I ever saw and I was awestruck. I saw it ironically on a videotape that my English teacher had taped it off of public television- channel 11 here in Chicago. However, she had erased over it(the first 3/4 of the movie), as I had asked her if she could tape the season finale of the first season of "Twin Peaks"-whoa, I'm dating myself! Thank you Mrs. Cantrell for introducing me to a master director and shaping me into what I am today; though I always tended to favor the weird, whimsical and offbeat. So, I immediately rushed to the video store and rented out a copy of "Juliet"("Giulietta degli Spiriti,") so I could watch the first part. The print on the video was pretty old and faded but I've been enjoying Criterion's excellent remaster. This dvd is stunning and the colors are so vibrant. It just reminds me of an Easter, pastel fantasy- all that is transgressing in Juliet's disturbed mind.
In the opening scene, Juliet sets up for a romantic evening with her husband to celebrate their wedding anniversary but instead is disappointed when Giorgio comes home with an entourage of their freinds. Later, Juliet and freinds engage in a seance session with the assistance of Genius, the mystic. It is determined that Juliet is also gifted and has sort of a sixth sense and gravitates to spirits. Iris, a spirit that has surfaced from the seance follows Juliet throughout the film and becomes her conscience. Juliet escapes in her fantasies and hears so-called spirits may lead the viewer to believe she has gone off her rocker! Juliet's visions and or images vary from the beautiful to frightening. She's a tormented soul since her younger days as her childhood freind Laura committed suicide for love. Now as a lonely housewife she witnesses her husband calling out another woman's name as they lie in bed together. She suspects her husband is having an affair and hires private investigators. Juliet also appears to have an inferiority complex towards her overcritical mother and more "successful" older sister. In the interim Juliet befreinds Suzy, the lady of the villa next door. Suzy head of the bordello style household throws extravagantly lavish orgy filled parties and immerses Juliet in her freinds, weird play acting, sex and wine and even sets Juliet up with her nephew for an evening rendevous. Juliet struggles with her self; she desires to fulfill her lust for sex and man but the spirit of Laura is persuading her not to act upon her desires as it is sinful.
Will Juliet find her inner peace? Will the spirits guide her or is it just all in her world of fantasy she has created for herself to escape from harsh realities of life including her husband's infidelity. Or will she follow the path of her childhood freind Laura who is in eternal peace.
Julius-Allan H.
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