Reviews

This is one of Fellini's best movies, and one of the most underrated pictures of all time. This masterpiece includes all the main themes of Fellini's career. It doesn't follow a "prose style", but a "lyric style". It's like a visual poem. In fact this film narrates the journey of Ivo Salvini (Roberto Benigni) through dreams and memories, which actually belong to the great director. As a matter of fact Salvini, alter ego of Fellini, says: "I love to remember, maybe more than living". The protagonist wanders in the countryside, asking himself about life, and meets Gonnella (Paolo Villaggio), who feels himself oppressed by the giant and factitious society, made of useless appearance. The noisy square is the symbol of a chaotic society (circensian, as Fellini would say), where the individuality is dead, superseded by an alienated mass. This crowd is insensitive to the voice of inner being, to the voice of the moon. In this film the noise contrasts with the silence, the loud public square contrasts with the noiseless countryside, which helps along subjectivity. The omnipresent television clashes with the moments of poetry, like the scenes of Benigni reciting poems of the Italian romantic poet Giacomo Leopardi. Poetry wins over the modern society, which doesn't listen the voice of inner being, deafened by the noise of the Machine. Poetry is like a flight, like a dance, like music (the waltz scene in the disco is wonderful). At the end only the most misunderstood people can catch the moon, that glow of infinite. Nobody can explain what happens. Maybe it's not necessary to explain. It's enough to keep silence and listen. Benigni and Villaggio are two great actors, the soundtrack by Nicola Piovani is impressive and touching, the set design by Dante Ferretti has a beautiful imagery, and the direction of the master is outstanding as usual. All that enables us to listen for a moment the voice of the moon.