Federico Fellini's latest work is an oddly unaffecting look at moviemaking and the director's own youth, a sort of "8 1/2" meets "Amarcord" but without the resonance of either.
Actually, "Intervista" is more like Francois Truffaut's "Day for Night," another meditation on filmmaking, or "The Dream Machine," if you will, this one following Fellini's usual abstract form but making it a little too loose fitting.
Using a semi-documentary structure, the setting is the famed Cinecitta Studios in Rome as a Japanese television crew follows Fellini around while he is making a new, autobiographical movie. This affords backstage jabs at the business, putting some of the famed filmmaker's tricks on display and making various observations about the business, many of them comic in nature.
Unfortunately, it also makes for a very episodic film, and only some of those episodes are memorable. Among them are scenes of the young Fellini (played by Sergio Rubini), arriving at the movie studio to interview a big star (Paola Liguori); a series of "Fellini Characters" auditioning for roles in his film; a very bizarre wedding, which in itself is sort of a Fellini tradition; a number of elephants; and best of all, Fellini reuniting the stars of his 30-year-old classic "La Dolce Vita," Marcello Mastroianni and Anita Ekberg.
The latter scene, which is casual, relaxed and sincere, is the perfect cap to the film as a whole. It's truly a joy to watch Mastroianni and Ekberg as they sit together, wistfully watching their younger selves in "La Dolce Vita's" famous fountain scene.
"Intervista" isn't really a bad picture, but it is certainly "inside," pretty much exclusively for fans of Fellini — and no doubt a must for them. But even that audience may feel a sense of disappointment or at the least may feel a bit wistful, since this is certainly not an example of the director at the top of his game.
"Invervista" is not rated but would probably carry a PG-13 for profanity and a couple of vulgar dialogue exchanges.