FilmJerk Favorites

A group of unique directors and the essential works that you've got to see.

||| Federico Fellini |||
Federico Fellini

Fellini transfigured joy into style and shaped fanciful hallucinations into some of the liveliest and fantastic films ever made.

No life is complete without a glance into one of cinema's most resplendent films-about-films, an awesome exhibit of Fellini's fantasies, dreams, fears, and neuroses that, ironically, masquerades as the story of a filmmaker in an artistic slump.

Guilietta Masina, one of world cinema's treasures, plays a young woman sold into the service of an oafish strongman, in this early Fellini that oscillates between magic realism and the lingering legacies of neorealism. By turns enchanting and melancholy, and always warm, the film will, ultimately, just break your heart.

Fellini transforms the tale of a lovable prostitute desperately searching for true love on the streets of Rome into a masterful celebration of humanity and affecting ode to unbroken character.

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Melinda and Melinda

By BrianOrndorf

March 30th, 2005

Woody Allen’s career has been on the slide for a long period of time now, and while “Melinda and Melinda” doesn’t restore the crown to the king of comedy, it does find him marginally back on track.


During a lively dinner conversation, two friends, one a dramatic playwright (Larry Pine) and the other a comedic one (Wallace Shawn), take up the challenge of interpreting one story in their own unique ways. The dramatist takes the tale of Melinda (Radha Mitchell) barging into a neighbor’s dinner party near suicidal, as the start to a long tragedy where in marriages are broken (including Chloe Sevigny and Jonny Lee Miller), emotions scattered (Chiwetel Ejiofor), and Melinda is left exactly where she began. The comedic tale features the same arrangement, but focuses on how Melinda’s life changing aura helps an unhappily married man (Will Ferrell) get out of his marriage with a cheating wife (Amanda Peet).

Legendary filmmaker Woody Allen has been in quite a rut lately. 2003’s “Anything Else” found Allen at an all-time low, quality wise, so it comes as somewhat of a relief that “Melinda” returns Allen to more steady ground; yet, his film still feels like a work completed with one eye closed. The jokes are there, but nothing is funny, the performances lack a spark that was never a question before, and Allen’s trademarked exploration into the mental state of intellectual New Yorkers has never seemed this abrasive.

“Melinda” is divided up into two films, and Allen balances the opposing temperatures of the script brilliantly; the trouble comes in Allen’s attempt to wring something resembling life out of his script. For most of the film, “Melinda” sits limp, waiting for an actor or Woody himself to liven it up and give the material some authority. The dramatic side of “Melinda” moves slowly and carelessly, nary giving a chance for the characters to break free from their wine-party stereotypes and register emotionally like the argument requires. The comedic side is much easier to take, this being Allen’s forte, yet the jokes never arrive like one would expect. In fact, “Melinda” barely records a laugh the entire running time. And that’s a very strange experience for a Woody Allen film.

Equally as odd about “Melinda” is where the interesting performances come from. Seeing Will Ferrell onscreen, hamming it up Upper-West-Side style is a beautiful idea; however, Ferrell is stuck doing a tepid Woody impression, which doesn’t look right on Ferrell’s hulking frame, and sounds even more ridiculous. Unexpectedly outplaying everyone is Chloe Sevigny, who finally gives her first full-throated adult performance with her role as an unhappy wife with a crush on Melinda’s boyfriend. Sevigny finds the right wistful tone to play in, and her work here is outstanding.

In the crucial title role, Radha Mitchell is all wrong for the part. For the film to connect, Melinda needs to be a mixture of sexual predator and sympathetic lost soul. While Mitchell looks the part, her acting isn’t instilling the character with anything as memorable as the script suggests. It’s a disappointing performance, and is the heart of why “Melinda and Melinda” doesn’t penetrate the senses like Woody Allen is more than capable of doing.

My rating: C-