1960 / Federico Fellini > Movies about one’s own person, as to say how a person matures, even in older age, how one adjusts to aging itself, how to basically understand life and one’s position in that life, these are notions that have been tackled over and over in cinema. Such a view of humanity is usually inspected in a smaller scope, observing the nuances and tackling singular topics. But more often than not, this lack of scope leaves too many gaps from the palette of life’s emotions.

Fellini, though, captures everything in La Dolce Vita. There are no other ways to describe this than with the kind of love and admiration one has for the medium itself, and how glad I am to have finally witnessed the kind of work that makes watching cinema a necessary part of life. It’s as if Holden Caulfield grew up and just happened to be Italian. From head to toe, the superficial glitter slides off to always reveal a piece of the puzzle. The world around him seems to be a joke, but at the end, nobody’s laughing. When you’re not laughing, is it because the joke wasn’t funny? Or is it because the joke’s on you?