Federico Fellini seemed to think that to use the motion picture screen as a canvas for his imagery constituted great film art, and photographically, it does, but Juliet of the Spirits collapses under the weight of what is essentially another Fellini daydream of fantasy orgies.
Juliet of the Spirits is passed off as a tale about a woman's retreat into a fanasy world when she realizes her husband is cheating on her, but when we watch film after film of Fellini orgies (can you think of a movie of his that didn't have one?), whose fantasies are these really? Not Miss Masina's, I'm sure, and that's why it doesn't work. The imagery isn't really connected to anything, certainly not to the woman's character. This is simply a case of Fellini (45 when he made this picture) having a middle-age crisis and projecting his hidden desires on to a motion picture screen. Instead, I felt bad for Miss Masina, who is forced to wander through this pastiche, not only to confront her husband's sexual fantasies, but to participate in them as an up-close observer, which has the net effect of being invited to a party just to be shunned by the guests.
When we see the all-too-brief scenes of Miss Masina hiring detectives to tail her husband, we are suddenly reminded that she is really a terrific actress; they are the few truly absorbing bits in the film. But then, unfortunately, we return to the empty imagery, which isn't absorbing in the way 8 1/2 was or in Orson Welles' "The Trial". It is a montage, imagery for imagery's sake. The color is vivid and the compositions are superb, but that's about all I can say for it. Otherwise, it's the usual Fellini grotesques and ghastly faces in fright wigs and too much makeup. Even the young women are horrid, they look like young, inflammated Phyllis Dillers. And so goes Juliet of the Spirits, the decadent private thoughts of an aesthetic madman. 2 ** out of 4
Juliet of the Spirits is passed off as a tale about a woman's retreat into a fanasy world when she realizes her husband is cheating on her, but when we watch film after film of Fellini orgies (can you think of a movie of his that didn't have one?), whose fantasies are these really? Not Miss Masina's, I'm sure, and that's why it doesn't work. The imagery isn't really connected to anything, certainly not to the woman's character. This is simply a case of Fellini (45 when he made this picture) having a middle-age crisis and projecting his hidden desires on to a motion picture screen. Instead, I felt bad for Miss Masina, who is forced to wander through this pastiche, not only to confront her husband's sexual fantasies, but to participate in them as an up-close observer, which has the net effect of being invited to a party just to be shunned by the guests.
When we see the all-too-brief scenes of Miss Masina hiring detectives to tail her husband, we are suddenly reminded that she is really a terrific actress; they are the few truly absorbing bits in the film. But then, unfortunately, we return to the empty imagery, which isn't absorbing in the way 8 1/2 was or in Orson Welles' "The Trial". It is a montage, imagery for imagery's sake. The color is vivid and the compositions are superb, but that's about all I can say for it. Otherwise, it's the usual Fellini grotesques and ghastly faces in fright wigs and too much makeup. Even the young women are horrid, they look like young, inflammated Phyllis Dillers. And so goes Juliet of the Spirits, the decadent private thoughts of an aesthetic madman. 2 ** out of 4