British distributors Eureka Entertainment have officially announced and detailed their upcoming Blu-ray release of director Federico Fellini's La città delle donne (1980), starring Marcello Mastroianni, Anna Prucnal and Bernice Stegers. Street date is February 25th.
Federico Fellini's epic 1980 fantasia introduced the start of the Maestro's delirious late period. A surrealist tour-de-force filmed on soundstages and locations alike, and overflowing with the same sensory (and sensual) invention heretofore found only in the classic movie-musicals (and Fellini's own oeuvre), La città delle donne (City of Women) taps into the era's restless youth-culture, coalescing into nothing less than Fellini's post-punk opus.
Marcello Mastroianni appears as Fellini's alter ego in a semi-reprise of his character from 8-1/2, Snàporaz. As though passing into a dream, the charismatic avatar finds himself initiated into a phantasmagoric world where women — or an idea of women — have taken power, and which is structured like an array of psychosexual set-pieces — culminating in a bravura hot-air balloon that decisively sticks the "anti" up into "climax".
A great adventure "through the looking-glass," as it were, of Fellini's own phallic lens and life-long libidinal ruminations, La città delle donne sharply divided critics at the 1980 Festival de Cannes, some of whom had merely anticipated a nostalgic retread of the earlier Mastroianni works. What they were greeted with, and what remains today, is, in the words of Serge Daney, "a victory of cinema".
Special Features:
Glorious new HD restoration of the film, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
Newly translated optional subtitles.
A Dream of Women, a 31-minute documentary on the making of the film.
Notes on City of Women, a 61-minute documentary about Fellini's film.
Dante Ferretti: A Builder of Dreams, a 22-minute documentary about the great production designer behind the film.
A 12-minute video piece with filmmaker Tinto Brass discussing the picture.
The original Italian and French theatrical trailers.
Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
A truly refreshing old school take on feminism and the effects of lesbian-centric rumination on the thinking and, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, on the pop ideologies consumed by modern society. Placing such an iconic "ladies man" as Mastroianni in the predicament that unfolds is truly a bit of devilish mischief by Fellini! All the fan boys should be watching this instead of Batman...
Well, EricJ, I have been willing to gleefully see anything filmed by Fellini since "La Dolce Vita" exploded on the scene in the early 1960s. And I'd rather watch Fellini's films than most anything produced today. That's for sure. Let's hope we get a US-release of this soon--and "La Dolce Vita" as well.
