Sophia Loren: Of Strangeness in the Proportion

 

“There is no exquisite beauty… without some strangeness in the proportion.” - Edgar Allan Poe

We have millions of Monroe and Bardot lookalikes, but there are few, if any, women who remotely resemble Sophia Loren. What is it about her beauty that it should be restricted to one face only, ever?

The eyes, the nose and the lips – the proportions are odd, yet together proffer an allurement more supplication than seduction. If sound took form we would see harmony.

Her face remains more in memory than on a screen – for that’s where she belongs amid timeless shadows and sighs, the candle-lit embrace under a windswept moon with everything drifting out to dawn.

She could only come from an old land of sun and sea where the past is bemused by the present, knowing the love of life leaves you untouched by time. You can see it in her smile and the way she swirls her skirt. When she’s around, you don’t need a clock.

Marcello Mastroianni and energetic ennui

"In the name of the Father, the Son..."

In his best roles, Marcello Mastroianni offered us a unique kind of detachment, call it energetic ennui. It's a tricky combination, light but brooding, gothic but with an appetite for fresh pasta.

An acceptance in the eyes

He was an actor unafraid of emotional extremes. Indeed, in La Dolce Vita, he is slapped about by existential ghosts, neutered in his quest for meaning, never knowing where to even begin the search. He plays a writer named Marcello (ah Fellini and his scattershot against the fourth wall) who must choose between evil (journalism) and good (fiction). The fact that this film gave us the term ‘paparazzi’ is a rather powerful clue of Fellini’s mind.

A unique kind of detachment

Marcello’s erotic baptism in the Trevi Fountain, with high priestess Anita Ekberg, is iconic, speaking a truth we are sadly too sophisticated to believe.

There was a resigned acceptance in his eyes that blessed humanity on its own terms, forever rendering him an ineffective villain. A love of life, and a playful, droll, gentle frolic with death. A leader who only wanted to follow. A passionate man who couldn’t stay mad. A devoted lover who left at dawn.

When he died the Trevi Fountain was turned off and draped in black. That says something. A baptismal font rarely offers an exit. 

Federico Fellini: Life is a party. Let’s live it together.

A black & white study of color

Someone once said of Charles Dickens that with all his plot contrivances, his silly character names, his terrible coincidences and reliance on low-end melodrama, he should be bad. Really bad. But he’s great. And he’s great because through it all his over abounding love for life shines through like a summer sun.

Love for life. Love of life. When you consider Federico Fellini, consider love and life. It will get you through the often meandering story structures, the over-reliance on the grotesque, and the unsatisfying conclusions.

You see the colors, the emotions swirling up like kite tails, unpredictable and playful. You see the people, who often seem to belong to a kind of theatrical troupe, argumentative but rarely mean, cheerful but foolish, wounded but dancing into tomorrow.

Fellini takes off the makeup

As Guido says — his greatest character in his greatest film — “What is this flash of joy that's giving me new life? … I feel I've been set free. Everything looks good to me, it has a sense, it's true. How I wish I could explain, but I can't... I'm not afraid to tell the truth now…what I'm seeking... Life is a party, let's live it together. I can't say anything else, to you or others. Take me as I am, if you can... it's the only way we can try to find each other.”

‘Felliniesque’. Few people have had their surname metamorphosed into an adjective, but how else to define this indefinable parade of glistening souls.

“Life is a party. Let’s live it together.” Federico, we try, but unlike you, few of us dream in color.