I don't understand the appeal of this film. It has no plot (which is not necessarily a bad thing. Another Fincher/Pitt collaboration from 1999 comes to mind), the protagonist has no goal, and the film basically has no conflict.

Massive Spoilers Below.

Button is a FREAK. You would think his life would be a living hell full of torment and meaty conflict...but no. Button's life is wonderful. He rarely encounters hardship.

He gets abandoned by his father, who shows up later and gives Benjamin everything he owns. He is taken in by a loving woman who cares for him every step of the way, keeping him far from anyone who would consider him to be a freak. He lives the good life growing up...or would it be down? He gets a job handed to him while sitting on a bench (a job that he loves so much that he would have done it for free, but he's getting paid!). He travels the world feeling no ill effects and not being taunted or ridiculed one single time for his disorder.

Most difficult situation he encounters is being left without a life jacket when the tugboat encounters a German WWII sub, which the tugboat ends up defeating with such ease and rapidity, Benjamin doesn't even have time to do anything but crouch down for a minute and hide. The lack of a life jacket doesn't even come into play at all. A set-up with no pay-off. What was the point of that? The episodic nature of the story makes it difficult to remember whether Tilda Swinton's character showed up before or after Benjamin went to war, but it doesn't even matter. Swinton has an affair with Button, but Swinton's husband is a spy! Oh shlt? Nope. That is another set-up without a pay-off. More conflict avoided. It's an affair without any repercussions.

The closest the film comes to a plot is the love story between Daisy and Benjamin, which is also the closest the film comes to displaying any sort of real conflict. Benjamin goes to New York to surprise Daisy only to find out she is with someone else. She rejects him. Benjamin goes to Paris. Daisy rejects him again. However, the rejections are only temporary, and Daisy forgives him entirely. More conflict avoided.

From there on, they live a wonderful life. There is even a montage showing how wonderful their life together is. Neither one has to deal with any sort of conflict for a while. They just have sex and fun all day long. They eventually end up having a child together, and Benjamin decides to walk out on them to avoid the possibility of conflict arising from the fact that he will eventually grow young and Daisy will have to care for both of them.

So despite his radical disorder (that nobody even really comments on, let alone ridicules him over), Benjamin goes through what some would consider a perfect life. He ends up with everything he wants and doesn't even have to work to get it.

Hell, I wish I was born backwards so my life would be free and easy.

How could a story with a concept so ripe with conflict completely avoid it?


Technically, like most of Davin Fincher's movies, "The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button" is a wonder. The curious saga of a man ageing backwards, gives Fincher the possibility of doing what he does best, tricks. It is the drama part that he doesn't seem to master or perhaps he doesn't care. "Zodiac" was his most coherent dramatic venture. Here he gets infatuated by the CGI and manages some spectacular punches but it is thanks to Brad Pitt the the exercise has a soul. He is truly remarkable. He manages to overcome the distraction of the gadgetry and show us the interior of the man. Brad Pitt's warmth wins over David Fincher's coldness and the most successful parts of the film are reflected in Brad Pitt's eyes. Geared towards an inexorable ending, there are moments of real beauty and tenderness. I'm convinced those moments could have been captured with a Super 8. The over direction of Fincher puts the emotional undertone in real jeopardy but, thankfully, the overall experience is mostly a welcome and rewarding one.


The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was a near epic film in almost the same way Forrest Gump was. I am not particularly a fan of David Fincher and his work. Yet I strongly admired The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. This film is about a man named Benjamin Button who leads much of an ordinary life under not so ordinary circumstances. The one thing that separates him from any other human being is that he ages backwards. Despite such large differences between the audience and Benjamin Button, the film finds a way to connect with a large variety of people in a way that does not seem to happen so often.

The acting was very good throughout the movie. Especially that of Cate Blanchett who seems to be turning out one great performance after another. She plays the role of Daisy, Benjamin Button's real love interest from start to finish. In fact she played so well it might have been a partial downfall to the movie. Her performance out shined that of the main character, played by Brad Pitt. Although Pitt was very solid in his performance I do not believe he deserved an Oscar nomination (rather Blanchett deserved one) for his role of playing Benjamin Button. He was not a necessity to the movie and did not add much to it. He was not bad but he wasn't spectacular. Throughout though many of the different actors and actresses lit up the screen. Especially Tilda Swinton who was wonderful to watch as Button's short lived love interest. Her presence was magical and a joy to watch. I would have loved to see just a little bit more of her character.

The directing of David Fincher in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was of what I believe to be his best work to date. The screenplay of Eric Roth was written very well as he has had experience with these type of movies. In many scenes the dialog and great direction combined for some epic scenes.

Ultimately I enjoyed this movie very much but something felt missing from the movie. Something seemed left unsaid that was vital. I felt that the great downfall to this movie was that Brad Pitt didn't give an amazing performance and did not take control of the movie rather Blanchett stole the show from him which made Button seem less important to me. Despite that though it this film was done very well and I would recommend it to all. Its an important story that makes us self reflect and think deeply. It displays how we need to live with our mistakes because they are part of our life. We need to appreciate what we have rather than wonder "what if...?".


I wasn't particularly enthralled with the idea of this film before seeing it but there was nothing else good on, so I gave it a try. An interesting idea for a film, that he grows physically younger but mentally develops in the normal way. However, this leads to many inconsistencies in the storyline. It doesn't make sense that Benjamin, when he becomes a father, decides to leave and travel the world. He looks of the age to do something like this but he's meant to be more mature... And when he's an old man in a young boy's body, he has a tantrum like a young boy would, but that doesn't fit the idea of the story, either... When trying to find the point to this whole story, all it comes down to is that we should look after those close to us and take more care of them. Well, that's an original one! To me, it became extremely boring as there is never any deep meaning to it and it just keeps dragging on for far too long when you can see that it's quite a stupid idea to put into a film. The anecdotes in the story, the acting and the direction are all good but in the end, what's the point?


I found this to be an interesting film; certainly not boring as I had heard from a few people who saw it in the theater. To me, it was simply good storytelling.

Yes, it's slow, especially by today's movie standards, but it's certainly a unique story and it's nicely filmed, acted and directed. Story-wise, it's one of those films I understand if people love it or hate it. I'm somewhat in the middle and leaning toward the positive.

For a movie that runs for over 2 hours and 40 minutes and is not some suspense or action film, it has to be pretty good to hold one's interest. I can only speak for myself; it held my interest for 95 percent of it.

I think the first two-thirds of the movie is the best. Brad Pitt as "Benjamin Button" is pretty fascinating, as is the story of him growing up from a wrinkled, old man-baby to a mid-40s guy. When he re-unites with childhood friend "Daisy" (Cate Blanchett) and becomes her lover, the film bogs down in a few spots but few people are going to stop watching after investing two hours. It picks up again, especially in the last minutes when "Benjamin" begins to finally become younger than an adult.

There's a sadness to this story, especially near the end but overall, even though it's central theme seems to be "death," I don't think it's a depressing film. It does remind us, in a big way, that the longer we're around, the more death of friends and loved ones we witness. That's just a sad fact of life. I hear about it all time with my father, who is 91 years old and has seen almost all of his friends die.

It's especially true in this story when Benjamin starts off and has a lot of old friends to begin with! "Benjamin" was an odd person to me; you could root for him, yet not admire him. He often treated people only to satisfy his desires and could have been so much more. Yet, being "a fly on the wall" and observing his interesting life, was memorable, making this a film worthy of the time invested to watch it.

In the end, the movie made me appreciate the friends I do have, and not to take any of them for granted as life passes us by so fast, no matter what direction we're headed!


When this film was over (saw it on a late show on Christmas Day), I knew I had just experienced one of the most powerful cinematic masterpieces of my life. "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" is quite possibly my favourite film of the last 5 years (not since Sofia Coppola's "Lost In Translation" a contemporary film had moved me so much). I had high expectations for it, and they were way surpassed (fact: after "Se7en", "Fight Club" and this, nobody will deny David Fincher and Brad Pitt make great films together).

"Benjamin Button" is the story of a man who ages backwards. Played and narrated by Brad Pitt, BB is the epic account of this extraordinary life, with focus on all the special women that were part of it (Taraji P. Henson as the mother, Cate Blanchett as the love interest and Tilda Swinton as a married woman he has an affair with). As a humorous, romantic, melancholic and visually stunning tale of a sweet-natured man who's different from most people, the film reminds me of "Forrest Gump" (which was also adapted to the screen by Eric Roth), but it is even more groundbreaking. It's hard to see a film that has it all, but TCCOBB is one of those. It's like a great epic from Hollywood's Golden Age, when a good story was as important as the magnificent sets (the art direction, cinematography and make-up are all fantastic, by the way, as is Alexandre Desplat's musical score) that populated them  something very rare today, when CGI dominates most movies.

We had a few great films this year  from the king of blockbusters (Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight") to a compelling biopic (Gus Van Sant's "MILK") to brilliant indies like Danny Boyle's "Slumdog Millionaire", Mike Leigh's "Happy-Go-Lucky", Charlie Kaufman's "Synecdoche, New York", Thomas McCarthy's "The Visitor", Courtney Hunt's "Frozen River", Tomas Alfredson's "Let The Right One In" and Jonathan Demme's "Rachel Getting Married", but I doubt I will see anything as good as David Fincher's masterpiece so soon. In other words, an instant classic (there, I said it). 10/10.


Brad Pitt makes his mark as an actor here as Benjamin Button, a man with a strange disorder - physically aging backwards. Along his emotional journey of life he encounters friends, family, loved ones, adventures, and most of all, chances.

Rarely has a film keeps the realism intact while still sustaining the magic of it. Truly, David Fincher and Pitt have created a film that is leaps and bounds ahead of its time. Taking a strange and fascinating tale and making it into one of the decade's very best films is something of an accomplishment.

Pitt, here, is an actor, not just a pretty face anymore. With the state-of-the-art visual effects at his hand, he pretty much carries the whole show. It is perhaps the first time since Andy Serkis' rendition of Gollum in The Lord of the Rings, that great acting has eclipsed terrific special effects. You genuinely feel and sympathize for his character, rooting for him all the way. Pitt owns the film, in short. He and David Fincher make a great team, and they look unstoppable to create more terrific films.

For the supporting cast, Cate Blanchett plays the love interest of Daisy to great effect. Her tale with Benjamin's make them somewhat star-crossed lovers. I won't go that far into detail but you'll see much later into the film. Taraji P. Henson also shines as Benjamin's surrogate mother, who gives her son the support he needs. Not to mention Tilda Swinton as an early love interest.

The screenplay by Eric Roth is excellent. Told from Benjamin's point of view with some highlights by Daisy, there are no clichéd dialogs to be heard, and the script is filled with equal moments of joy, ecstasy, sorrow, and understanding. Some dialog here is timeless and quotable, such as the film's tag-line; "We are defined by opportunities, even by the ones we miss." When you age backwards, you get more chances rather than missing it. I love that and wish for it, but sadly that is what movies are made for. And if that is what you've been thinking after or during your viewing of this film, then this film has succeeded.

David Fincher is a tour-de-force of film-making. Straying away from gritty violent thrillers such as "Zodiac", the unmatched "Fight Club", and "Se7en", he takes a bizarre love story, the most expensive budget he's faced, and crafts a film with such substance and flair that he adds quality to the film. There are moments in the film which make it obvious Fincher is calling the shots. The paced is slow, but this allows us to absorb and be infatuated with the characters. There is not one dull moment in the film. It is constantly gripping and re-watchable.

Technically speaking, the cinematography and lighting is absolutely perfect; gorgeous to the eyes and senses, and while giving the right tone and feel to the film shows us director Fincher's trademark. Accompanying this is the beautiful and heart-wrenching score by Alexandre Desplat, which is absolutely flawless. The special effects are unique and well-made, and you'll find yourself confused to whether certain scenes were made with special effects or not. If you want to see actors when they were young this is the best rendition of effects possible, and I hope the future movies use more of this amazing technology to make their stars more bankable. The special effects deserve their Oscar for it is the best I've seen in any movie in 2008.

In short, it is a beautiful, tragic, and terrific movie. It is certainly timeless and will stand the test of time, and hopefully, age well like fine wine (no pun intended). This absolute gem deserves the nominations it gets, too bad it was released the same year as Slumdog Millionaire.

Overall rating: 9/10


This film is worthy of a 10/10 rating simply because of its imaginative and complex nature, I mean, I couldn't bring myself to know why this simple idea of a man aging backwards hadn't sprouted up before. Set all the way back at the end of the Great War, to New Orlean's meeting with Hurricane Katrina, this movie tells the story of Benjamin Button, a baby born an old man of eighty, destined to die in the mere form of a zero-year-old. I found this movie very emotional and special because there's reeally nothing like it. I honestly thought, when I found out the immense length of the film, it was going to be boring....I was wrong, it gripped me from start to finish. There are many emotional and touching scenes in it, including the end, where it brings forth Benjamin Button's 'younger' years as an old man. Nothing went wrong with the cast, Brad Pitt played a great job as a reverse-aging man, and Cate went well as his childhood friend. Overall, this movie was great and I recommend it to anyone who loves the genre.


I can't see why others rate this film so highly. Maybe because people are so used to seeing visual trash from Hollywood these days, when they get visual trash with some good acting, they call it a masterpiece.

Benjamin Button is a very well paced, visually affecting movie. But it is one that leaves you feeling hollow. The feel for the characters due to the skill of the actors, but you are given no understanding for their motivations. Why did the female lead desire so much to be a dancer? Where was Benjamins conflict about leaving his family? Layer that with the oh so obvious feeling that this was done before (and better) with Forrest Gump and you feel like this is a rehash of the same idea. Now throw in cliché after cliché (crazy sea captain, dancer struck down ridiculously in her prime, lovers buying a love nest and painting the walls...) and you end up feeling like you have gone on a ride, but it didn't make you feel any differently than when you got on. You can't identify or understand what has happened, so why is it important? Are we all so gullible these days that any movie with some enhanced visuals and good acting gets called a masterpiece?


First off, let me start by saying that a 10/10 is not enough. Never have I cried so hard at the end of a film. I even cam home no more than half an hour ago and cried on my bed. This movie really gets to you, and I know that this may sound a bit cliché, but it has everything an excellent film could want. Comedy, drama, romance, mystery. I know some people out there may not agree with me, (like that butt - hole roger ebert who only gave it 2 and a half stars!) however I am finding it difficult to put into words how great this film is, as emotion has swarmed over me. The Curious Case Of Benjamin button is now easily in my top 5 greatest movies of all time. To not see this movie would be a grave mistake. I am so yearning to read the original book. I know this review/comment may sound like someone rambling on but this movie, without a doubt, is perfect. That's the only word I can use to describe The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button...... P-e-r-f-e-c-t. I don't just highly recommend this movie, I hearteningly implore you... nay, beg you to at least watch this film once, as it will leave you swept off your feet with vast amounts of emotion. And that's all i have to say about that.

Adios ! Y'all


Greetings again from the darkness. No doubt headed into this one with inflated expectations of greatness. While the basic theme fascinates me, the execution of the storyline just didn't quite keep my interest. Mostly I just kept asking why. Why do so few people realize what is happening? Why is BB attracted to Cate Blanchett's character (most guys would have run away)? Why is Cate's character attracted to BB (he seems quite dull)?

David Fincher is a stud director with a resume that includes Zodiac, Fight Club and Seven. He seems to do what he can with Eric Roth's adaptation of Fitzgerald's short story ... I just felt it needed more detail and more happenings. Our only real glimpse of BB's travels are on the tug boat and those are probably the highlight of the film, next to the uniqueness of the make-up and special effects. Contrast this to the far superior Forrest Gump, also penned by Mr. Roth.

Brad Pitt plays the role in a disarmingly quiet mode, while Cate Blanchett and Tarij P Henson go overboard. The New Orleans setting and other set design were outstanding. The flashback scene from the hospital death bed is given a nice twist with Katrina bearing down. Seems to be a movie many would enjoy, I had just hoped for a bit more.


Disappointed I was. After being thoroughly excited to see this film ever since I first caught wind of it, I left the theatre in a state of bewilderment. How could such a masterful director and a bevy of talented performers and crew produce such meaningless and pointless drivel? More than that, how could they have fooled damn near the entire population into thinking they had actually made a good film? At this moment the film is #71 on the IMDb top 250. The #71st best movie of all time? Are you kidding me?

Brad Pitt fails to register a single honest emotion. Pitt utters every single line in exactly the same manner. I don't think his facial expression changed once throughout the entire 2 and half hour run time. Benjamin Button himself is not even remotely close to a fully developed character. He plays piano and likes Daisy. That's all we know about him. Oh, but he ages backwards. Yet that fact lends absolutely no circumstance to the entire picture until the very end of the movie when the writers needed a cheap copout in order to get out of the complete mess that they had put themselves in, it's like "Wait a minute, we can't possibly earn an Oscar if this thing actually ends happily, let's make our main character do something only a complete S.O.B. would do to create some tension and then completely excuse him for it." It's cheap, easy-way-out writing.

The special effects are superb, do not let this review diminish the efforts of the technical team. The characters change drastically physically, yet they do not go through a single change mentally. They are all static. It's almost as if the performers put too much faith in the make up and effects teams and didn't even bother to put a different edge on their characters. In my opinion, Benjamin and Daisy were utterly boring, the Clockmaker who is given two minutes of runtime was a far more interesting character than those two. Every scene in the hospital halted any momentum that the film was gaining, they simply brought everything to a dead stop. There was absolutely no point to the scenes at all, the moments of revelation were completely predictable, and how many times do we need a film that is set up by somebody reading a diary? And holy crap, Daisy's southern accent miraculousy became about ten times as thick as she lay dying in the hospital than it did in the early years of her life. Weird....

All told, the film seemed like it was brewed in a lab to win awards. However, the filmmakers forgot a couple of important things: developed characters, meaningful scenes, conflict, and a believable ending.


Yes, Benjamin Button is a good film and a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours. It looks beautiful, sounds beautiful but we must all be really starved of good film-making if this movie gets people waxing lyrical. It's a great high concept idea, but what do the film-makers get really out of that besides the "life is unpredictable... you never know when change is gonna come" theme that permeates the movie. Well, dah, there's nothing that profound about that. Also, while Brad Pitt is gorgeous to look at, and a very likable movie star, his performance somehow left me a little cold - it doesn't hit any deep emotional chords, and while you could praise him for being subtle, he just doesn't have the everyman quality, that sense of human anguish anyone can relate to, that someone like Will Smith does. I wish he would just let go a little more like he did in Babel, and really show us the man behind the beautiful veil. David Fincher got gritty and great in Zodiac, but he gives in to style a little too much in Benjamin button - too many beautiful shots of Brad Pitt on motorbikes with sunglasses on, in front of a magnificent sunset. I wanted the whole movie to feel more real. Don't get taken in by the hype, Oscar voters!


The Curious Case of Benjamin Button so uniquely approaches its subject of life and death that one can't help but ponder its themes of love, existence, and mortality. Director David Fincher's latest garners an epic feel, not from its rather lengthy runtime, but from spectacular storytelling and intricate character development - or perhaps undevelopment. A slight loss for affecting drama and a few borrowed elements from notable predecessors can't detract from the amazing journey at hand, one brilliantly entertaining and curious indeed.

As Daisy (Cate Blanchett) lies dying in a New Orleans hospital, she has her daughter Caroline (Julia Ormond) read to her from a mysterious diary that chronicles the peculiar life of Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt). Born as an old man, Button steadily grows younger as everyone around him grows older, and a majestic tale unfolds, one filled with adventure, intrigue, and an epic romance that transcends the restrictions of time.

It's a meditation on life, death, time, fate, forgiveness, love and every emotional experience in between; most often it's beautiful, melancholy, romantic and saddening, but ultimately it suffers from the futility of a predestined course. Although it borrows memorable elements from Titanic (narration by an older character reminiscing on the past) and Forrest Gump (a hummingbird replaces the CG feather, and Cate Blanchett's Daisy mirrors Robin Wright's Jenny, most noticeably in her acceptance of Button only after numerous experimentations in love), The Curious Case of Benjamin Button doesn't suffer from unoriginality. It is exciting, dramatic, epic and refreshing; it may be flawed, especially from a lengthy running time, but still manages to be one of the more impressive films of the year.

The tagline reads: "Life isn't measured in minutes, but in moments." Although the film doesn't exceed at any one element, with its lengthy running time it does include moments for everyone. Falling slightly short in the affecting drama expected of its epic scope, Button still beautifully showcases romance with the constant gaining and losing of Daisy; action at sea with the patriotic Captain Mike (who is also reminiscent of a Forrest Gump character: Gary Sinise's Lt. Dan); and comedy relief aplenty, most memorably from a man who was struck by lightning seven times. The film's focus is mainly about the events and characters that affect Benjamin, as opposed to his own influences; he is an observer of his own existence (thereby decreasing the potency of Pitt's performance, but perhaps increasing its refreshing subtlety). The importance of life and death, the experiences of growing up, and discovering sexuality and love are all viewed in a new, backwards perspective (frequently discouraging for Button - "some creatures aren't meant to survive"), which gives an entertaining twist to the majority of events which would otherwise be unceremoniously routine.

- The Massie Twins


I had such high hopes for this film. The previews for it were visually stunning and it looked like David Fincher had crafted a modern masterpiece. Fincher was coming off the artistic triumph of Zodiac and I assumed this film would follow suit. As a director, Fincher seemed to have shaken off his obsessions with fashionable nihilism. In this light The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a fascinating yet ultimately very hollow film. Fincher is obviously a gifted filmmaker, so it is all the more disappointing that he has tethered his story to banal sentiments that would be better suited to a greeting card.

The first hour of the film holds up quite well to the high standards set by Zodiac. The digital cinematography of the piece is murky, but appropriate in that I believe Fincher wanted it to look like an old photograph. The central conceit of the main character aging backwards is clearly and cleanly established and we are in immediate sympathy with Benjamin Button. Anyone who is related to or knows someone who struggled with a horrible illness at a young age will respond to the early scenes of this film very strongly. Benjamin's wide-eyed naiveté as he tries to grasp the complexities of his special existence is very touching and delicately dramatized. These early scenes have real unforced charm. We get to know not only Benjamin, but the kind African-American woman who shelters him. We are also given a small window into the lives of the other residents of the rest home where Benjamin resides. There are very few movies that have even dared to explore the hardships and also the small compensations of advanced age. These things are not usually discussed in popular entertainments. David Fincher and screen writer Eric Roth should be commended for even broaching some of these issues. Unfortunately, time and again a challenging idea or issue is raised and is then immediately dropped in favor of forced uplift or is simply glossed over completely. Every time things get interesting, the plot kicks into gear and the film falls back on movie logic. The premise of the film is so provocative, that I had real hope after the first hour that we were going into uncharted narrative waters. Sadly, we are then given the usual pseudo-revelations involving doomed romance and familial ties.

Benjamin Button is the window through which we view the other characters. His condition sets the stage for the more colorful characters to behave in eccentric and idiosyncratic ways. The film is essentially a reverse coming of age story. As the film progresses narrative problems start to crop up with alarming frequency. The central issue is that Benjamin never really drives the story. He is a reactive character and because of this you lose interest in his goals. Pitt tries to invest a sense of humanity. However, the blank cipher that is Benjamin Button remains stubbornly vague. We know that Benjamin loves Cate Blanchett's Daisy, but are not given anything further to define his character. Benjamin appears to be a pleasant companion and not much else. As Pitt gradually morphs into the Greek God matinée idol that we all know him to be, the movie deflates like a balloon.

Benjamin's relationship with Daisy is endless and largely drama free. There is a sense of going through the motions with everything that happens in the second part of the narrative. The lovers experience a short idyll, a child is born, and then the narrative demands that Benjamin leave Daisy and go on a vision quest or something. The film does Cate Blanchett few favors as her character changes from scene to scene depending on what the needs of the narrative are. Like Pitt, she is playing an idea rather than a real flesh and blood character. The two of them are so attractive and movie-star like that it actually detracts from what the tragedy of the film is supposed to be. You can't help but wonder why these two are not more thankful for the obvious gifts they have been given? The rote, glamorous Hollywood fantasy is like a tow line holding this film back from the darker waters that it obviously needs to plumb.

The film employs a ridiculous connecting device of having the elderly Daisy dying in a hospital bed in New Orleans as Hurricane Katrina approaches. She requests her daughter, a haunted looking Julia Ormond, read to her from Benjamin's diary. A diary that neither she nor her daughter have apparently ever looked at before. This subplot is squirm-inducingly awful. We can see every supposed secret the diary holds coming a mile away. When these plot points are revealed Fincher skips past them, denying them emotional weight and trying to camouflage their utter banality. One would expect that the rapidly approaching Hurricane Katrina would figure into the plot somehow and one would be wrong. Like every other provocation in the film, the enormous human rights disaster that was Katrina is introduced and then shied away from. This bungling of a potentially provocative theme is unforgivable. Fincher and Roth should be ashamed for the short dramatic shrift they give Katrina.

The more I thought about this film, the more I disliked it. Fincher is too intelligent a filmmaker to embrace this sort of dishonest, Hollywood, twaddle. On a technical level the film is second to none, which makes it all the more of a let down that it contains no real ideas about anything. Why is it that entertainment must be so bereft of commentary relating to the real world? Is escape all that filmmakers and audiences aspire to anymore? We live in an era of unprecedented global tumult. I am sorry, but escape is just not good enough for these times. One need only look at the politically and culturally engaged films of the seventies to see what we are missing now.


Saw "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" last night. I can't resist a new David Fincher film. It deviates wildly from the F. Scott Fitzgerald story (which could be why I liked it so much). The performances, make up, and directing are all amazing. The screenplay is a little slow and meticulous (Eric Roth also wrote the screenplays for Forrest Gump, The Horse Whisperer, Munich, The Good Shepherd) but the directing made it work perfectly (give me Fincher over Mann, DeNiro, Redford, Spielberg or Zemeckis any day). It really doesn't feel like a two and a half hour film.

I could easily envision Oscar wins for Fincher, Taraji Henson, Brat Pitt and Cate Blanchett.

Be warned - it is a bit of a tear jerker. It deals with mortality quite a bit, as well as the usual heady subjects of love, loss, war, and redemption... with just the right touches of passion and joy.

10 out of 10


On a cold night on the eve of WWII in Russia, a diplomat's wife (Tilda Swinton) shares tea with a most peculiar tugboat man named Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt). When she asks him where is he from, Benjamin replies, "New Orleans...Louisiana." Swinton's character replies, "I didn't think there was any other."

This moment comes about forty minutes into the film which has been established on the grounds of a woman (Julia Ormond) reading to her dying mother (Cate Blanchett) from the diary of Benjamin Button as Hurricane Katrina sweeps over New Orleans. The ghost of a New Orleans now lost haunts David Fincher's lyrical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story about a man who ages backwards. There's no denying this film couldn't have been made five years ago, not only because the technology wasn't there to make the process of aging backwards look real, but it would've also been a completely different movie as screenwriter Eric Roth wouldn't have been able to bookend the film with Blanchett on her deathbed as Hurricane Katrina comes to literally wipe away her life. The story is hung on a gimmick, and the film told as a fable, but there's grounding in the reality of life's greater mysteries that speaks volumes about not just the death of a man or a woman, but the death of a city and the death of a way of life.

A big part of making the audience believe in the story falls on the film's technical aspects: the make-up, the CGI, the period-piece details of the film's set designs and costumes. If you look close enough, you can find things to nitpick, like the distracting disembodied voice of Cate Blanchett distorted onto a little girl, but for the most part Fincher constructs it all seamlessly. In terms of scope and sentiment, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" seems a complete departure for a director usually obsessed with darker more violent tales, but Fincher has always liked his plots to begin (think "Seven" or "Panic Room") or end (think "The Game" or "Fight Club") with a gimmick, and he's always been a filmmaker obsessed with cutting-edge technology (think of the VIPER camera used to film "Zodiac"). Fincher does a superb job with his meticulous construction of these elements (complimented nicely by Alexandre Desplat's subdued score), and he really wins the audience over with his flashbacks within flashbacks that are done in a charmingly stylized manner that remind us we're watching a movie that's meant to be enjoyed above any other pretense.

By shifting the central location of the story from the original setting of Baltimore to New Orleans, Roth opens the film up to a new layer of interpretation. Though the episodic tale of Pitt's Benjamin growing younger while Blanchett's Daisy grows older spans the globe from Manhattan to Russia to Paris, the characters' hearts remain united in New Orleans. Roth, who also penned the thematically similar "Forrest Gump" peppers his screenplay with many momentous events from the 20th Century, but those moments ebb and flow through Benjamin's life just as the other characters do showing us that life is made only of moments. None of them last forever.

The supporting players (including a gutsy performance from Taraji P. Henson as Benjamin's adoptive mother who runs a nursing home) are wonderful and allow Pitt and Blanchett to shine as the movie stars that they are. Sure, these two have probably given better performances elsewhere, but here they have been given roles for which they might be best remembered long after their star-power has dimmed.

In a year when the films with the most impact (like "The Dark Knight") have been those that have tapped into the fears and mindset of the times we live in, it's rather fitting that a movie like "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" comes along at the end of the year. It should be one of those movies that hold audiences rapt in hushed silence, but it's also the type of movie that usually receives instant backlash. I wonder how it will stand up over time. On the surface it attempts to tell a timeless tale, but in a bittersweet way proves the opposite. Movies stars like Pitt and Blanchett, movies like this, stories, fables, dreams, cities like New Orleans...none of these things are timeless. Timelessness is just a flight of the imagination...like the idea of a man aging backwards.

But what a wonderful flight it is.


For special effects and make up, this movie is incredible. However, the length of the film causes one to believe that there is a lack of overall substance. Its message is cluttered by a series of life moments that are reminiscent of Forrest Gump without the humor.

As advertised the plot of the picture is both simple yet intriguing. The movie traces the life of the main character Benjamin Button born as an 80 year old and growing younger every year and his life's intersection with Miss Daisy first seen as a young lass who recalls the story in flashback form as a dying elderly invalid. The intersection of their lives when both are substantially the same age forms the tension in the movie.

The ending is the strongest part of the film. One should try to stay awake for the first hour. I was underwhelmed by Brad Pitt's performance. Given his incredible acting ability as shown in the earlier Burn After Reading movie, Pitt relies on the special effects and make up to carry his role.

The elderly Daisy character recollecting her past is reminiscent of the elderly female character in Titanic. The story telling devices used in this flick have been used before in more memorable movies.


"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" though a fairy tale film of wonder, excitement and joys of unexpected moments broadens it's themes more in depth by showing the joys of life and love. Adapted from a short story from F. Scott Fitzgerald the direction from David Fincher(one who's known for his dark thrillers like:"Seven")is beautiful as many scenes were done so well with the wizard of computer magic and top notch camera work. Yet most catching of all is it's message proving that each have an expected path in life everybody has a fate. Yet this the main character lives his in a most unusual way he lives it backwards! Just imagine escaping the norm as we are so use to living and being in existence from birth being young and living life till our old body gives out. Only how about trying it in reverse! This film has star Brad Pitt(Benjamin Button) who's born as an 80 year old and during his life span he ages backwards all the way to an infant. Yet from the beginning of his start in New Orleans at the doorstep of an old folks home his life spans thru the years from his meeting of people and friends to travels and journeys of memories that anyone would cherish.

Beginning with Button's friendship early on when he befriends a little female Daisy(wonderful performance from Cate Blanchett)and many years later as Benjamin starts to gain his youth he once again meets up with Daisy along the way after she's became a successful ballet dancer and the two will develop a passionate romance and love story that anyone would dream of it was just so true and simple.

The film even though long moves well with it's journey of drama and life discovery for Benjamin as it's memorable for his working and making a living on a tugboat. And his first love and his being seduced by an elegant and sophisticated married lady(played gracefully by Tilda Swinton). The film is clearly a journey of life's common ups and downs that are common for all yet this man's story of age and living is most uncommon.

Overall this film is a masterpiece of joy told thru flashback it's a real taste of a historical journey of love, drama, and changing and most of all it shows to be happy with yourself no matter what. It's fairy tale and magic theme is well enjoyed as the wonder and thrill to see of how one can age backwards and still enjoy life, have success and discover love is amazing. Remember everyone is different, it's okay to be different and everyone lives and does life in a different way. That's what this epic masterpiece of a film shows it's clearly an emotional, and touching picture to love for the way it shows how life can be in a different order yet still it shows that it can be memorable.


('Til today I thought TDK was going to the best movie of '08.)

Make no mistake about it this is David Fincher's best film! ...Button has all the power of Seven but for entirely different emotional reasons.

This is a warm, thoughtful, thought-provoking, heart breaking, uplifting example of what happens when great writing meets visual artistry.

The only thing I'll say about about the story is that it is about the love of Life & Death & Love. Those of you who --like me-- who were looking for the ultimate Twilight Zone episode will not be disappointed. It is a love story. It has a love of language. It is complex. It is beautifully acted. It breathes (it is nearly 3 hours long because it had to be). It uses lightning as a punchline over & over again to great effect.

Fincher has always been a Michaelangelo, a Rembrandt, a DaVinci when it comes to visuals & he at the height of his powers here. If you are not seduced by what you see then Button may bore you. There are frames in this film that I could stare at for long, long minutes rather than the few seconds that they appear on screen.

HOWEVER

No movie works if the story doesn't grab you. Obviously this one has it. Visuals aside, it is a delight to listen to as well as look at.

The performances from a large cast lead by Brad Pitt & Cate Blanchett are wonderful.

I've read some early reviews that the movie is ultimately cold --a common Fincher rap. It has Fincher's trademark intellect (if he hasn't trademarked it yet, he should). IT IS NOT COLD. It has the emotional power of a tugboat bring in a wrecked liner.

Others criticize Button for being too much of a good thing & that it has too many elements & it does. And I'd rather have a film try too hard then try too little.

You had to wonder why they waited until Christmas Day to release this film. The answer arrives when you see it because it is the only day they could have released it. THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON is Santa's (and Fincher & crew') present to people who truly love movies.


A washed-up boxer is given a magical chance to win an important fight, thanks to the "big, tall wish" of a little boy who idolizes him.

This is one of the most underrated episodes of the series, featuring brilliant performances from Ivan Dixon as the fighter and Steven Perry as the boy. Remarkable for its time as a TV episode featuring African-American actors in flesh-and-blood roles, but had nothing whatsoever to do with civil rights issues. Serling's sensitive script and innovative direction also help create a beautiful and superbly realized story about the importance of faith, and the tragedy of the cynicism that age and experience can create.


A boxer finds himself magically winning a fight he actually lost. It is due to the wishes of small boy who admires him. This allows him to move on to a more important fight. This is about the idea of faith and hope. As the episode goes along that faith and hope disintegrates. The boy becomes a victim. The issue that is more important is the color blindness of Rod Serling. I would imagine a cast featuring two African Americans would have been extremely bold at this time. I wonder how Joe Six Pack would have received this, even if he were a fan of the Twilight Zone. The acting is good and it was good to see the late Ivan Dixon (Hogan's Heroes) doing quite an outstanding acting job. It makes you wonder how many wonderful actors were locked out of the industry. Serling was a visionary.


I'm having difficulty assimilating the message of this episode, it doesn't come across as all that positive to me. You have young Henry who thinks the world of Bolie Jackson - "You're my friend Bolie, you're my good and close friend". I have to tell you, that kind of friendship is worth more than anything else in the world. With not enough people in the world to believe in magic and wishes, I found it almost cruel that Bolie would take away Henry's big, tall wish to do something wonderful for his friend. Yes, I know, Bolie was trying to help Henry realize that the 'real' world doesn't work on hopes and wishes, but would it have been so bad to help Henry believe in miracles? You know, the kind of miracles that resemble 'Yes, Virginia', the kind that turns a loser into a winner with a prayer and a just make it so. I thought it just a little sad that Henry 'grew up' at the end of the story by realizing that he might be too old for magic and wishes. I'm trying hard to come up with an alternate ending for the story, but I'm coming up empty. It seems like this time, Rod Serling painted himself into a corner and couldn't come up with a clever way out. A better take away might have been for Henry to learn that trying and failing is better than not trying at all, and would have made Bolie a better friend for being that teacher.


Rod Serling had an affinity for boxing in his stories--in particular, the life of an old and haggard journeyman boxer. In addition to "The Big Tall Wish", he penned the gritty and sad script for "Requiem for a Heavyweight" (which was both a made for TV movie and feature film). It's obvious that Serling must have hated what this 'sport' did to men and he had a deft touch with such stories.

This particular tale is about Bolie Jackson (actor/director Ivan Dixon)--a sad man whose face show the scars indicating a man who has stayed too long in the fight business. He has a special friendship with a young neighbor boy who looks up to him and adores him. Though Bolie is all washed up, to Henry he is somebody to admire.

Oddly, Henry seems to believe that if he wishes hard enough, that ANYTHING can come true--even Bolie winning a match he has no chance of winning. Like the movie PINOCCHIO, if you wish hard enough anything can happen. Through a twist like you might expect in "The Twilight Zone", this wish seems to come true...as long as you believe.

Overall, this episode lacks much of the weirdness and strange twists that I loved from the show. However, at the same time, it also had wonderful acting and a superb script about people--something you often did not see in other episodes. While not a great installment, it had heart and was sad but well-written and worth seeing. It also was nice that for once in this era a Black man and cast be featured in a mainstream TV show.


My brother and I have been watching and re-watching Twilight Zones since they first an live back in the early 60's. This episode has always been one of our favorites. "the Big Tall Wish" is a great tale of hopes and expectation wrapped subtly in the history of race. The scene in which the impressible kid who makes 'the BIG WISH' is quite memorable . . . "Please, Please . . . .". My brother and I would talk about when we would potentially need to make the BIG WISH. And then it happened. . . My brother Jeff, who lives in Los Angeles, had been in New York during the ALCS series. Being both ardent Red Sox fans for over 20 years at that point, we were really bummed by the way the Series was going. The night before he was leaving to go back to LA was almost the last straw. The Sox lost to go down 3-1. Jeff, who had tickets to the game the next day stated forlornly "I'm going home to a funeral". The game the next day was close but the Sox found themselves down by 3 entering the last at bat. Don Baylor hit a HR to bring them within 1 run. With 2 outs and a man on, Dave 'Hindu' Henderson came to the plate. The Angels countered with their top reliever, Donnie Moore. My brother, sitting in the left field bleachers and sensing the impact of the moment, closed his eyes and made 'THE BIG TALL WISH'. 'Hindu' promptly launched one into, of all places, the left field bleachers. Although the Angels tied it up, the Red Sox eventually won the game and went on to win the series. My brother called my right after the game hysterical and mumbled something about making 'THE BIG TALL WISH'. I knew immediately what had happened and how our mutual adoration with this series and, in particular, this episode had changed the course of history. at least from our distorted perspective.


`Playing the Field' is a delightful series from the pen of Kay Mellor who gave us the excellent, much darker `Band of Gold'. We again have a group of women at the centre of the story, this time they are soccer players rather than prostitutes.

Although issues like drug-taking, infidelity and a shocking family secret are included `Playing the Field' is fairly light-hearted and good-natured and if you can't guess who wins the climactic Cup Final Well, I'm not going to provide a spoiler! As a matter of fact I found the actual scenes of ladies playing football the least convincing part of the show.

The top grade cast is of great interest with two of the stars of popular English comedy-drama `Cold Feet'. James Nesbitt & John Thomson, appearing as well as a couple of faces from the hilarious `Royle Family' plus the superb Lesley Sharp (Clocking Off, The Full Monty), Melanie Hill (Crocodile Shoes) and others.

Highly recommended.


From trawling on the internet, I've discovered that there were 5 series of playing the field, of which I've seen the first 4. Series 5 was never released and I can't remember what happened in it from watching it on TV. Does anyone else know?! This was a good show, if a little predictable in places and some of the characters were slightly miserable! My favourite storyline was probably the Geraldine/Dave/Rick one, which, as I can't remember series 5 (and will never see it again unless it's released - hint hint!) I don't know the conclusion! This storyline lasted over all of the series so would have come to a really good ending - if only I could remember it! It doesn't make any sense to me to release the first four series and not the fifth - someone please take note!!!


I really enjoyed this series but why are none of the regular cast members listed on this page? Lesley Sharp and Lorraine Ashbourne to name just two of them. Mrs Mullen, Mr Mullen, Matthew Mullen, Luke Mullen, Jo Mullen, Theresa Mullen, Geraldine, Dave, Rick all of them are missing! What's going on? I tried to find out the name of an actress who was in this series and her name is not listed. A lot of the actors in this series have gone on to star in many other very watchable programmes. It is disappointing when you look for information on this site and it is missing. I looked for details of a recent programme and there was no information about it at all! I know it must take some time to catch up but I really find this site useful and have been quite disappointed lately with it.


If one rates a film on visuals alone, Fellini's SATYRICON would surely be completely off the scale: a phantasmagorical mixture of sensual beauty and the distasteful but evocative grotesque set in an ancient Rome that never was, never could have been, and yet which plays up to every extreme concept we secretly harbor about Roman decadence. The leading men are incredibly beautiful; the women are generally seductively depraved; and the broad vision that Fellini offers is easily one of the visually stunning creations ever put to film.

And yet, oddly, the film is sterile. The story is impossible to describe, a series of largely unrelated events in the lives of two impossibly handsome youths (Martin Potter and Hiram Keller) who begin the film by battling over the sexual favors of a slave boy (Max Born) who alternately unites and divides them until all three find themselves sold into slavery and flung from adventure to adventure, most often with sexual (and frequently homosexual) connotations. Clearly, Fellini is making a statement about the triviality and emptiness of a life lived for physical pleasures alone.

But the film is jumpy, disjointed, disconnected; the sequences do not always arise from each other in any consistent way, leaving viewers with a sort of "what the ..." reaction when the film unexpectedly shifts without explanation. (This is actually in keeping with the original ancient text, of which only portions remain.) In consequence, SATYRICON is ultimately less about any philosophical statement Fellini may have had in mind than it is about sheer pictorial splendor and deliberate weirdness.

Whatever its failings, it is an astonishing film, and one that would have tremendous influence on a host of directors who followed in Fellini's wake--although all to often without his style and vision. Clearly Pasolini, director of such works as SALO, ARABIAN NIGHTS, and CANTERBURY TALES spent the better part of his largely unlamented life trying to out-Fellini Fellini; likewise, it is impossible to imagine how Tinto Brass and Bob Guccione arrived at the notorious CALIGULA without reference to Fellini's SATYRICON.

Such efforts to expand on SATYRICON were merely more explicit and less interesting than the original, and I do not really recommend them--nor do I really recommend SATYRICON for any one other than Fellini fans, for with its oddly disjointed feel it is unlikely to please those raised on mainstream. Still, it is a powerful, remarkably beautiful, and completely unexpected film that must be seen at least once by any one with a serious interest in world cinema, and to those I recommend it without hesitation.

Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer


Fellini engages us through a tapestry of decadence during the Roman Empire with such stunning juxtapositions of exceptional images from a collapsing society that one cannot help but be reminded of our own times and its disconcert morality

The film is freely adapted from Petronius' book, which is the exploits of two young Romans, Ascilto and Encolpio, as they venture throughout the empire, indulging in both heterosexual and homosexual relationships In the course of this proliferation of sensuality, Ascilto becomes impotent and madly goes for a cure which ends in tragedy for Encolpio

The movie's treatment of the sexual decadence is remarkably powerful without being explicit In fact, in light of the mental images it presents, it actually puts on view very little on screen But there is a great quantity of mysterious whores, hedonists, gluttons, and gross indulgence in carnal pleasure In the midst of this chaos, however, there is a beautifully light reprieve as the young Romans come across a forsaken villa... A very charming slave girl has remained behind, and she playfully troubles the two men into an erotic game

Apart from that, the sex is portrayed as bizarre, tempting, suggestive of hidden secrets, violating the rules of morality, and going beyond the limit


"Satyricon" is among the weirdest and most colorful, larger-than-life movies I've ever seen, along with Erasurehead, Erendira, Santa sangre, Naked lunch... If you don't like these, don't even try "Satyricon".

On one hand, its many flaws are rather upsetting. The out-of-sync lipping (bad post-sync), the fact that the movie neither really tells a story nor evocates sensible moral or philosophical concepts... so one may say it's actually a dull movie. The violence in this movie doesn't seem to make real sense, neither does the homosexuality, neither does the "romanian decadence" portrait.

On the other hand, the scenography, the sets, the costumes and makup are among the most dazzling ones you'll ever see in cinema, and the cinematography... well... maybe the BEST one you'll ever see. I can't think of any another movie able to compete with "Satyricon"'s mindblowing cinematography. Each scene is a terrific picture, with several visual layers, extraordinary lights and focuses, a lot of invention, of visual flair, and the overall technical mastery is stunning.

The result is something mesmerizing for some, totally disgusting for others. I have to say I'm more on the mesmerized side, because I was mainly focused on the visual/meditative aspects of the movie, not on the narrative ones.

If you're really into cinema, I mean as an artistic media more than as entertainment, you MUST see "Satyricon", as it's to my sense the most *visually* outstanding movie ever made. Be prepared for some disappointment about the movie as a whole, though...


It was well known that in the late 60's, famed Italian director Federico Fellini experiment with LSD. That's why "Juliet of the Spirits" was so bizarre and colorful. But the 1969 head trip "Fellini Satyricon" was even stranger than previous Fellini films. Loosely based on the novel by Petronius, the beginning of the story concerns two men in the B.C. Roman era fighting over the love of one boy. Later they have many strange and colorful misadventures. This film may be to bizarre for some; with its grotesque images, a mild orgy, dwarfs and even a hermaphrodite goddess. The set pieces are out of this world. It's like being caught in a two hour dream. Many times I had no idea what was going on, but that didn't bother me. Satyricon is a visual decadent head trip of color. Fellini considered this film a sci-fi of the past. I consider Fellini a genius; he's designed a film that makes a great substitute for drugs. If you enjoy "Fellini Satyricon" you should also watch Vera Chytilova's "Daisies" (1966), Alejandro Jodorowsky's "The Holy Mountain" (1973), Guy Maddin's "Careful" (1992) and Tsui Hark's "Green Snake". All of these film contain bright colors and surreal images. Enjoy!


This is by far not the best film I've ever seen, but it is probably the most important film I've ever seen. I saw it for the first time when it came out in 69, when I was 16. Before then, I was only marginally interested in films. Something to while away the time. And then I saw Satyricon. And life has never been the same ever since. All of a sudden I realised that film was more than simply recording images, all of a sudden it dawned on me that cinema could be art. Now, maybe Satyricon isn't great art, but to me at that time it was overwhelming. I'm sure other films have had this same catalytic effect on other people. Satyricon got me hooked on film, and I never looked back. I saw the film again about 10 years ago. I was amazed how it was still capable of exiting me. In spite of its wooden acting, its cardboard backgrounds, the unsynchronized lip movements this is amazing movie magic.


Fellini called his "Satyricon" a science fiction film projected into the past. His expressive portrait of ancient Rome is a richly ornamented fresco of contrasts; variations within a select kaleidoscope of opposites related to the sacred, the pure, the just, and the beautiful.

Reportedly a free adaptation of the now fragmentary writings of Petronius, the film also makes fleeting references to various scattered works and myths of antiquity. Even the language is a blend of various dialects and accents, effectively brewed together into a type of "primordial soup."

The film features a young man named Encolpio and his sometime friend Ascilto; both of whom seem to prefer participatory experience as a means to finding meaning in life while primarily disregarding status, power and possessions. Contrasting some of the film's more serene scenes with those of unrest and discord, patterns supportive of a life lived from a similar experiential perspective begin to emerge. Some examples are as follows:

During the "Death to the Classics" scene, the poet Eumolpo says that the arts have declined because the desire for "virtue" has been lost. Dialectical discussion and philosophy have been replaced with drinking, vice and monetary greed, thus preventing further creation of works of art at the same pinnacle of excellence as the classics.

Later when Eumolpo and Encolpio recline in the open field encased in an early morning mist, the elderly poet bequeaths to Encolpio a series of "natural" phenomena; among them mountains, rivers, clouds, love, tears, joy, sound, song and the voices of man...

During the "Matron of Ephesus" scene, a young woman mourning her deceased husband by starving to death in a cave has her chalk white face returned to its natural radiance after accepting the embrace of a handsome soldier. The moral being "...better to hang a 'dead' husband than to lose a 'living' lover..."

A politically doomed and suicidal married couple free their slaves whereupon a reference is made to the "sacred" earth. Their children are sent away to a place free from tyranny which will be "beautiful." Later, Encolpio and Ascilto arrive at the couple's elegant home and enjoy a night of revelry during which Encolpio quotes the "poet" as having said "...as for me I have always lived to enjoy the present moment as if it were the last sunrise..."

The tale of the beautiful Enotea and her subsequent punishment after she tricked the wizard who had professed his love for her seems to be a warning to remain "true" to expressions of affection.

Following what appears to be his final corruption after having abandoned his idealistic philosophy, Eumolpo proposes an interesting last will and testament. Those wishing to inherit a part of his worldly fortune are asked to devour his remains. Reflecting the hippie generation's symbolic scorn of rampant materialism during the shooting of this film, Encolpio and his friends smile and turn away, heading onward toward a new adventure.

The scenes of discord in the film appear to reflect issues related to social and political methods of enforced control over others. For example, during the banquet of Trimalcione, his sycophants eat, laugh, chant, dance, perform and throw objects on cue. While a captive at sea, Encolpio is made an object of entertainment for the pirate Lica. Later he is forced to battle a huge "minotaur' for the entertainment of a proconsul and his puppet court during the "gladiator prank" sequence.

Fellini makes strong use of colour symbolism in "Satyricon." The film opens in what appears to be a large Roman steam bath. There is the occasional sound of water dripping, and in Encolpio's tenement a seemingly wealthy group of party goers arrive on a small boat in the water, perhaps ready to go "slumming" with the poor. There is also a bluish tint to many of these early scenes as if they were being viewed through water. Later, during Trimalcione's feast, a flame red lens filter appears to overshadow the initial candle lit display giving the impression of an envelopment of fire. During the outdoor scenes on Lica's boat, the sound of the wind is recurrent and a blitz of snow appears providing a possible reference to the air element. Near the end of the film, Encolpio enters a maze by sliding in the dirt down a hillside. Following his battle with the minotaur, a dust storm blows as he attempts to make love with Arianna. Later, when he visits the elderly Enotea, she lets dirt fall from her clenched fists as if giving a silent reference to the earth element.

There are also many references to the supernatural and paranormal. Eyes stare into the camera as if to give reference to phantoms from antiquity looking at those presently alive as if to question. While Encolpio and Eumolpo have their discussion in the art gallery, a two tiered galley of soundless faces inexplicably passes by like unknown entities observing the men's conversation through a hole in the wall. There is a curious space-like object on the deck of Lica's ship. In addition, a momentary glimpse of supernatural visionary lights appear during the abduction of the "mystical" hermaphrodite who subsequently dies after having been exposed to the "light" of day. The film also presents a recurring symbolism of carved and imprinted heads eventually given great emphasis with Lica's startling decapitation. Perhaps the question is, has society become too obsessed with the intellect at the expense of the heart and the inherent value of the individual person? Perhaps not so for Fellini, as the entire film is intensely alive with a glorious blend of color; each face, each person, in Fellini's words, serving as an integral part of his artwork on film.

Finally, like the eternal wheel and his initial greeting, Encolpio's farewell is presented in front of a stone background and he is interrupted in mid sentence giving ....


There's not much of a story in SATYRICON: we follow the disjointed "adventures" of two young men during decadent ancient Rome. What follows though is pure visual brilliance. The film reminded me a lot of psychedelic European comic books of the late 1960s and 1970s. I saw this Fellini film on TV, in pan and scan, and even though SATYRICON has to be seen on widescreen format, the cropped version was still mighty impressive to look at. But to experience the complete visual splendor of the film, widescreen is simply a must!

The film did drag here and there (certainly with Fellini letting some vignettes last longer than they should) but overall, the cumulative effect of all the stories creates a unique visceral experience that's seldom seen, back then or since. My only critique with SATYRICON is that in the end, it feels more like some avant-guard experimental theater experience than an actual film. The set-pieces are so stagy that SATYRICON often looks like a filmed stage play. This doesn't make the film bad but its staginess detracts a bit from achieving the perfect surreal effect that only a true cinematic experience can recreate. I could not immerse myself 100% in it because the staginess kept reminding me that I was watching a film. Even Pauline Kael said SATYRICON felt like 2 hours of people walking along walls. That's a bit of an exaggeration but I agree with her point. The staginess (which I'm aware is part of the surreal effect Fellini wanted to create) keeps SATYRICON from being a definitive masterpiece.

Even so, Fellini's SATYRICON is worth seeing for anyone who's into bawdy, surreal visual feasts. It's a one-of-a-kind experience.


The cinema of the silent and Fascist eras in Italy was characterised by epic movies with mostly mythology-inspired themes. Mussolini, who came into power in 1922, the founder of Cinecittà, did not underestimate the importance of cinema as a means of communicating with the masses. Fellini notoriously called Giulietta Masina's titular character in Notti di Cabiria after the 1913 movie "Cabiria" by Giovanni Pastrone, a grand production with a visual flair not so dissimilar to Satyricon. Literally hundreds of characters parade in front of the camera in this visual orgy of a movie, evoking the memory of lost "Kolossals", or gargantuan budget productions.

Fellini's movie was only loosely inspired by its literary source, Petronius's Satyricon. The nominal "plot" follows two young Roman men, the blonde Encolpio and the brunette Ascilto, introduced as rivals in love for the coquettish, androgynous slave-boy Gitone. When the latter chooses to be with Ascilto, the spurned lover Encolpio becomes involved in a series of adventures, all narrated with a familiar (to Fellini lovers), non-linear narrative structure with temporal inconsistencies and dreamlike, sudden changes of setting and mood. Encolpio attends the decadent banquet of a former slave, Trimalcione, now filthy rich. Eumolpo, an impoverished poet whom Encolpio meets on the way there, despises the wealthy man, all the more so for being rich and for having the nerve to also call himself a poet. The faint-hearted may at this point find much to object to  the lasciviousness with which the banquet guests eat, drink and act lustful with one another is anything but subtle. The Trimalcione sequences felt to me like a satirical commentary on the rise of the nouveau riche in 1960s Italy. A highlight of the banquet scene is the story that the host narrates. It tells of a young widow, an oasis of cinematic calm in among the strident cacophony of the rest of the movie.

In a narrative passage which is reminiscent of the rhythm of dreams (typical of late Fellini, betraying his Jungian tendencies), Encolpio ends up captured by the pirate Lica, who takes him on board his ship. This is where the young buck meets Ascilto and Gitone again, also captives of the tyrant. At this point I was especially impressed with the extraordinary talent of Donati as a set designer. The ship wasn't built to look like a recognisable ship at all, but was rather like a symbol of one. Needless to say that no matter how abstract it was, you knew it was a ship, as its "ship-like essence" was all there! When Encolpio is beaten in a duel with Lica, he is forced to marry the pirate in a ceremony celebrated on the deck. But Lica is decapitated by some political rivals when a new Emperor takes over. "Everything changes so that it can all stay the same" is a cynical saying you still often hear in Italy. It refers to the fact that one greedy ruler will succeed another in a ruthless battle for power and privilege. That's when you realise Satyricon is a brilliant satire of modern society as well.

Encolpio and Ascilto then wander into the aristocratic home of a husband and wife who've just freed their slaves and committed suicide through bleeding themselves to death (a symbol of the death of aristocracy while the nouveau riche are getting fat?). After a threesome with a slave-girl who was left behind in the dead couple's empty home, the two young men attend a sort of sanctuary where an old man exploits the alleged healing powers of a very sick-looking, ethereal hermaphrodite child. Worshippers, lepers, cripples and sick people of all descriptions flock to ask for favours off the allegedly divine hermaphrodite. If this isn't a dark, ruthless parody of the Catholic practice of worshipping saints' relics, I don't know what is!

Subsequently captured by some soldiers, Encolpio is defeated by the Minotaur in his mythological labyrinth. The young man's life is spared when he literally talks the Minotaur out of slaying him, in a scene which is both post-modern and subtly comical. But a new humiliation is in store for Encolpio, which has him set off looking for the sorceress Enotea. Her story is told in flashback. Yet again, the prudish and faint of heart will not find the scenes of a cursed woman literally "giving birth" to fire through her vagina as their cup of tea! Though admittedly unsavoury, I also find such elements to be archetypically symbolic, and ultimately fascinating.

After visiting Enotea, Encolpio witnesses the killing of his friend Ascilto. Desperately upset, Encolpio decides to set sail for Africa on a merchant ship owned by the once-poor and bitter old poet Eumolpo, now as filthy rich and decadent as Trimalcione, whom he had once criticised for his parvenu vulgarity. When the old poet dies, he leaves a testament stating that whoever will eat his corpse will have a share of his wealth - basically, inheritance by cannibalism! Encolpio refuses the deal, while a group of greedy Roman dignitaries are shown chewing on what must obviously be the dead poet's tough old flesh, looking like so many fat cows chewing on their cuds. If a satire of a stagnant and greedy society was ever more potent and cutting than this, I would really like to hear about it!

Fellini himself defined this movie as being "Science fiction of the past". The movie's complete and intentional artifice, its occasionally obscure symbolism and gallery of grotesque portraits and strident soundtrack may not be everyone's thing. What is especially unsettling about Satyricon is that the viewer is led into a realm in which you have no idea what boundaries might be crossed. That's exactly why this is a perfect portrayal of an epoch of complete moral decadence - it drags the viewer into the exact same realm of uncertainty that the characters experience.


I think this is one of those "key" films for a director, that may not necessarily be his best, but is filled to the brim with his passions and obsessions -- or, the passions and obsessions he doesn't bring up in his other films. The fact that a major artist could direct something so homoerotic and so in-your-face makes me respect Fellini all the more. It's hard to tell what, exactly, the film is or is meant to be: it's a satire and an honest costume drama, a sword-and-sandal epic, a fantasy, an attack on the senses and an art mockery, and a love story. It's also very sexy. Some of the scenes between Encolpio and Ascilto, both astonishingly beautiful men, are so erotic you can't believe this movie was accepted at the time. Obviously the movie is at first a gross-out masterpiece, a flaunting of Fellini grotesqueries, where there is boy-loving and boy-selling, decapitations, and farting.

As a comedy, there's a great scene where Encolpio and Ascilto divide up their things, including the boy they use (who is much more feminine than boyish); as an epic there's a battle with a minotaur; as a romance there's a startling scene between the two men in bed with another women where one leans over to run his fingers through the other's hair; as an art satire there's the attack on poets who steal from others and claim it as their own; as a marriage comedy there's a scene where Encolpio marries an old man and is told he must give up his taste for young boys. (Encolpio resembles both Malcolm McDowell -- surely something thought of during the making of "Caligula" -- and a more mature Christopher Atkins in "The Blue Lagoon.") It's also interesting to compare this depiction of Roman society with our current one, and see if Fellini's view of same-sexuality and decadence has any resonance today. I think the comedy of the film is overlooked, as well; the competition between Encolpio and Ascilto, their vanity, sexual appetites, and Encolpio's eventual impotence, is very mocking, but never mean-spirited. Whatever this is, it's a very strong vision, and on that score alone it's worth watching. 8/10


It seems like everyone on this message board missed a very important point about Satyricon: It is based on a Book! So much of the "weirdness" is not Fellini's doing, but the author's! The book was written by Petronius, one of the Emperor Nero's courtiers in the 1st Century. The book is widely recognized by historians as a peek into the lives of lower class Romans, and the general social mores of the time. In addition, parts of the book were lost during the Middle Ages, so the sketchy, non linear storyline comes from the book, not Fellini! Besides being visually gorgeous, the film does a very good job of portraying how very different ancient Graeco-Roman society was from our own, and how sex in particular was not seen as shameful or in any way limited to a narrow idea of what's "normal" as it is in America today. Unlike recent Roman Period movies or shows - such as HBO's "Rome" - which are constantly trying to make the ancient world seem familiar and "just like us." Fellini goes the other direction, and gives the other side of the coin - YES, the Romans were "like us" in many ways, but in other ways, they were also quite Alien, and UN-like modern Americans - VERY unlike.


I've voted 8 out of 10 for Fellini Satyricon, but I can imagine that a few people may find that to be an overly indulgent grade. Actually, I know that a few people will feel that way -- I've shown it to several friends, and they all agree it looks beautiful and manages to amuse on numerous occasions. But they don't get much more out of it. That's too bad for them. Aaaw yeah.

As Vincent Canby said in his review, from 1970 in the New York Times, 'Fellini Satyricon is its own justification'. This movie exists purely to engage on an aesthetic level. The surrealism, the carnival-of-life atmosphere, the monumental pageantry, the visual juxtaposition of beauty and ugliness, and the black humour are all the film possesses and are all it requires. I believe that Fellini's intention with this film was simply to entertain. And he was a master entertainer, no doubt.

Don't expect much in the way of characterisation, of complex plot developments, or of nifty moral expression. This is a film that looks and sounds beautiful, and it manages to hold your interest (or mine anyway, I can't speak for everyone) for two brief hours by doing just that. Fellini = Godlike genius.


The opening sequence of this film mesmerizes as only a Fellini film can. In fact you are so intent on the back drop, it only hits you after the film is over that it was about (mostly) homosexuality. This film is a visual poem that makes total sense only on that level. When the final freeze (frieze) occurs, you feel as though you have awakened from a pleasant dream that made sense only in the fact that it was pleasant.

Was this ancient Rome? It may or may not have been, but Satyricon is certainly everything lacking from all other films about this ancient city which holds the modern fascination.


In the 1st century AD. a brilliant and witty writer named Patronius wrote a book called " Satyricon " and from it's inception, became widely popular. Unfortunately for us, the revealing book was said to have displeased the emperor Nero who was so envious of the author, he banned and ordered it destroyed. What was saved are only fragments of the original manuscript and thus director Federiico Fellini was hamstrung to complete the entire work. Consequently, the movie is seen in disjointed form. Nevertheless, what was crafted became a superb masterpiece of film. Despite the fragmentary approach, one needs only remember the decadence of ancient Rome, the times and it's many religious practices together with it's ruler and sloven people to understand the movie. The fragmented story is of two Roman youths Encolpio (Martin Potter) the romantic adventurer and his close friend Ascilto (Hiram Keller) the equally adventurous, opportunistic but morally corrupt companion. Together they share their travels, fortunes, possessions and a special love for their slave boy Gitone (Max Born) whom they have to extricate from a popular stage actor and his troupe. Fellini's illusionary film takes extreme literary license with their travels as they are invited to visit the very gluttonous rich, the inclement poor and the visually grotesque. Suffering earthquakes and enslavement they visit a pagan temple where they discover a rarity, the worship of a Hemaphrodite as a God-like deity whom they kidnap. Unfortunately the creature dies and they escape. Fearing the wrath of the worshipers they again travel abroad but soon find themselves in chains on a Roman slave ship which is then seized and boarded and finally they end up on an island where they are once again planning to embark on another adventure to search and rescue their lost slave-boy. Although incomplete like a puzzle, one must remember the director is working with only the remnants of the original work. This film or what there is of it, still remains an Italian Classic. ****


I'd been meaning to see this movie for about a year, before I was finally able to order it off the internet. I was not disappointed. I've never seen a Fellini film, but I'm definitely going to have to try sometime soon. I was utterly confused as to the story almost the entire way through, but I still grasped the concepts, and it really didn't matter. To appreciate this movie, you just have to suspend your beliefs for a while and watching this gorgeous movie unfold. I understand that the actually story is somewhat incomplete, as it hasn't totally been discovered intact. But, it's basic journey of these men is a sight to see. I was wondering if anyone else was struck by the resemblance of Gitone to Barbra Streisand? I noticed it almost immediately and thought it an interesting side note. Watch this movie. Don't try to understand all of it, just enjoy it, and be enthralled by Fellini's genius


In the first few centuries of our age, the roman world was in decay. In one hand there was wealth and abundance, in the other people were loosing their religion, their values and purpose of living. Collosseum games were a great part of people's interest -- some data indicates that, at some point, there were 170 days of games a year; that's 170 without work for citizens. Those who had power, had more interest in their orgies of eating and vomiting and their sexual perversities than in governing the people. Such is the image presented to us by roman poets of this period such as Juvenal.

Today, we'd rather see a good violent film than to watch, say a film of Ingmar Bergman -- which would perhaps give us more insight about life and about our condition as emotional beings -- and football is taking over our lives. Back then, people's interests were about romantic novels about triangular love affairs. This is the plot of Fellini-Satyricon. The screen play is based upon a roman novel, Satyricon, which mocked about those romantic novels and turned them upside down, by presenting the triangular love affair between two men and a little boy. I don't remember the name of the roman author of this novel but I know part of the text was lost.

It is not an action movie, nor narrative, it is purely pictorical. Fellini-Satyricon is the most striking depiction of roman decadence. It's not about historical facts, it's an image of what decadence can be. The relevance of this image is such that we even find an explicit parody of it in "Asterix in Helvetia".


This is definitely not the movie to see if you seek a good 80-90 minute soft action or love film for entertainment. On the other hand, it will take only two and a half hours of your time to see some of the most striking and colorful imagery of the roman world of all times - of which, every director has difficulty in escaping.

The final minotaur scene, I understand, is not on the original Petronius novel (it couldn't be). It is the "Fellinian moment" of the film. All of Fellini's films end up in some sort of non-sense apotheosis which take your feeling of being lost to the highest point -- and signals you, at the moment you were thinking you were starting to grasp it, that there's a whole lot more than what you can comprehend.

Fellini once said that he loved decadence much more than sound-mindedness, since the former was so much more rich in its imagery and colors.


Wonderful visual experience albeit light on plot. Surreal and sometimes disturbing. Somewhere in the bizarre world that Fellini created lies a kernal of truth. I imagine this film contains elements closer to real Roman life then Spartacus ever did(I know it's greek but whatever).


I find it fascinating to see how Fellini managed it to create such an unusual movie - a film that has nothing to do with all the other pictures of ancient Romans, made in the 60s. Although Satyricon looks so surreal, it shows us a much better way to understand how these people 2000 years ago actually lived & loved, as it's far away from the antiseptic hollywood-style, where the slightest hint to the real likings of many Romans was kept as a secret (like the cut out scenes in "Spartacus").


This movie is truly mesmerizing and, like Petronius' original novel, on which it was based, it one of a kind. This film is has bizarre dialog, repulsive images, many freaks of nature, strange music, scenes that don't make sense, and yet at the same time, repeated viewings will show that it does make sense... simply because the moral of this story is that it doesn't make sense, and life can go in a thousand crazy directions, we're all like dice in the hands of fate.

Other comments: Having read the original work, I can say that this is a very interesting interpretation. While not strictly faithful to the book and while sort of splicing certain events together and introducing some new scenes, this movie is actually pretty close in spirit to the book and as such, as I said, unique and really able to constitute its own genre. Comedy? Tragedy? Farce? Epic? Acid trip? Who knows!


The Satyricon was one of the most moving films I have ever seen. There was so much symbolism and so many undercurrents. I present a composite critique.

Fellini's omissions and additions neither contradict nor violate, but further define the surviving fragments of the original Satyricon. He had the task of making a continuous work of art of a scarred, fragmented torso with its head and limbs chopped off. Some of Fellini's sources of what is not in Petronius are from Suetonius, Ovid, Tacitus, Juvenal and Propertius. One might liken his reconstructing to that of a paleontologist giving form to a few dozen fossil bones. He stated that his intention was not to show vice or corruption, but to give an unbiased look at a morally decaying world. The film prefigures both the world of Rome prior to Christianity and the post-Christian world presently lurching toward birth. The moral violence that punctuates the film prefigures the irrational savagery of our own age.

Fillini rejects what has been written about the ancient world and sticks to what has been painted. The scenario synthesizes art, moving like music and spreading out like a suite of paintings, a catalog of images without character development, story, or drama. Dream-like images of anguish and obsessions demand great intellectual effort on the part of the viewer. His images are mesmerizing, like the waters of the Styx, and hallucinating like the canvases of Hieronymous Bosch. Painted flesh is brought to life and retains the sense of life on fragments amid the ruins.

We are presented a vast living fresco of Roman decadence as a metaphor for present society and as an allegorical satire of where we may be trending. The film is a window and a mirror where we may see both past and present at the same time, a world without moral anchoring, a nightmare world, a decomposing body infested with vermin. It is a fable for our times, equating moral decadence with apocalypse. Fellini constructs it with fresco-like mastery.

We are both fascinated and repelled. The young and the beautiful are as monstrous and impure as the old and the ugly. Fellini uses the grotesque to try to reclaim the viewers' lost sense of the mysterious, the transcendent and the holy. This grotesqueness zaps us into an encounter with another reality. Surrealistic elements dominate, pushing aside the human elements. Dissociations, or an alienated and incoherent simultaneity, are used to create the atmosphere of a dream. Fellini said that his film was "the documentary of a dream." The dream is frightening, because it is endurable only through intense and irresponsible indulgence followed by interminable escape. The characters are exiles in a world that is both of their own creation and beyond their control.

The film is heavy with Freudian symbolism. The over-painted fresco-like faces represent both the external masks of surface relationships and the masks that hide the darker impulses and compulsions that threaten to overwhelm and assume the identity of the ego. Fellini's film is a surrealistic vision of a hedonistic world where there is only the mask of the ego; there is no real ego to impose logic or reason, and no superego to impose ethics or morality. It is an id world that must inevitably consume its pawns, because it moves only on primitive drives, a world without innocence, purity, mutual commitments, restraints, or real love.

As a theme, one might say that the story is about the sexual education of Encolpio set in the context of a morally declining world. He triumphs over his opponents via his physical beauty; a wish-fulfilling dream of the adolescent who, confronting a terrible and corrupt world, finds that he can wander through it relatively unscathed, thanks to his youth and beauty. He disarms his opponents with his surface aura of innocence and sexual attraction, which saves his life more than once, but it emasculates him in his own conscience, eventually rendering him impotent with women. Fellini's oversexed, devouring women are not mother figures or love figures but symbolically wish to castrate. Rather than objects of idealization for completing the inner merger of male and female elements of the psyche they are nightmarishly intent on emasculation. They can function only as copulatory devourers. However, the death of Ascilto, Encolpio's alter ego, symbolically represents the death of Encolpio's homosexual desires and self doubts, restoring him to manhood and erasing his impotence.

Like the fragmented remains of Petronoius Arbiter's Satyricon, Fellini's film ends as an unfinished sentence. The characters are as if in a transfer pattern, frozen, plastered into separate decaying walls of broken masonry; it is our window to the world of Rome, but a world that mirrors a portent for the present and the future of our own world.

This is a film well worth viewing again and again to uncover its symbolism and deeper facets.


This is one of the most original visions and personal ever made in cinema about ancient Rome. It has all the mood and spirit of the classic Rome mentality and artistic way of life. Only an Italian could have describe this distant world so well and accurate.

 Everything in the production is carefully chosen and every detail has this very Fellinian touch of dreams and reality touching the very essence of the human life, and our psychology. This is an art master piece that shows what a movie should look like and makes us remember that films can be the most powerful artistic expression. the best scenes are the roman undergrounds full of whores and weirdos, also the big orgy scene is a classic with a very perfect direction, really good photo and artistic direction.


Satyricon, the most visually glorious film I've ever seen, is an art history textbook liberated from its pages and transferred to film. The images metamorphose from monochrome to color, from abstraction to realism, from seeming to be in a studio to being outdoors before your amazed eyes. The exteriors are breathtaking, the sets are superlative, the colors, the composition, the lighting are stunning. I've seen this in paintings and mosaics, but never in film. Not even Tarkovsky can compare.

Satyricon does not tell a story in the usual sense of the word. There are two protagonists, but their adversary isn't on the screen, he's in the director's chair. Fate pushes Encolpius and Ascyltos from one adventure to the next. Like reading Don Quixote, there are stories within the story and we lose our protagonists sometimes, but then they reappear to guide us to the next chapter within the art history book Fellini has created.

History, architecture, mythology, painting, poetry: these are the subjects of the movie. But even bigger than that is the true sense of mystery that this film evokes regarding art. Art was born out of mankind's need to create order in the face of chaos and mystery. The mystery still has not been solved, so art (this film, for example) continues to live. Art is humanity, and Satyricon is a waking dream on this topic. Although times change and mores shift, mankind hasn't changed much in the 2000 years since Petronius wrote The Satyricon. Within the chaos of this film you will find much that is familiar, even if you can't really tell your friends what it's about.


As far as plots go, movies differ. Some have obvious plots that have been done repeatedly in the history of film/literature culture. You know how the thing is going to end in the first five min. Others have plots that are there, but one has to watch the movie five times before understanding it all. Some do not have plots and everyone knows it, in which case it better have something else that is damn well done! Then comes along a movie, teetering on the thin line of questionable success where one can not tell whether there is a plot or not. If, while watching Satyricon you find yourself wandering whether it is going to wrap up finally into an understandable conclusion after which you can satisfactorily murmur `ahh yes, now I got it'. Well, in the end there is no such luck, sorry lads and lasses. Of the plot the one thing I could gather is that it is the journey of the main character who is searching for something, or some one? Very hard to figure out. It starts out as a conflict between one Greek lad and another who both have unbegotton lust of a younger lad then themselves. The lad ends up choosing one over the other, or something of that strange sort. The other goes off, into something like a whorehouse, or something. The whole thing is bathed in color of unnatural hue. But, I degrees., To get back to the supposed half invisible story line, the supposed main character goes off on a journey of many naked breasted strange looking ladies. The secondary characters all come in and disappear throughout the story. One really has to view this more as a surreal world with little scenes and parts that are not really connected by any great spine, because otherwise one is to be lost for sure. Over all it has the flow of an acid trip with some really pretty boys strange kings (or was there just one) and strange looking women! There is no doubt that there are many subtle points to be made, but it may not at first be clear what they are. Ultimately, if there is any sort of plot it probably revolves around a young man trying to find himself (or his sexuality) though different occurrences.


Satyricon is less a movie and more a series of complex images and actions. It is too long and tedious at times but ultimately fascinating. The costumes and the sets are spectacular, and some of the sequences are immensely entertaining. But, then again, the sequences are the problem. I first learned of the film while studying Latin and therefore was aware of the fractured nature of the original work and was prepared for the same in the movie, and while some of the action is provocative a fair amount of screen time is just, well, rather dull--its hard to follow and has no translation to modern times or sentiments, still through all the meandering there are moments--moments that are visually stunning, inspire awe, and feel like nothing from this world.


It is astonishing that the few surviving fragments of Petronius' work evoked such a stunning and Rabelaisian cinematic romp through ancient Rome. The author was extremely daring to flout the dangerous emperor Nero by satirizing the egregious excesses of the time. Keep in mind that he was executed for it and most of his work destroyed. The "party 'til you puke" attitude actually originated with the Romans, who provided feathers for the throat and basins for their guests to vomit into so that in voiding they could eat and drink even more. Trimalchio's banquet is typical, it's description is much of what is left of Petronius' work. The somber sequence depicting the dignified suicide of proscribed patricians reminds us that many prominent persons who fell out of favor by their political affiliations were forced to abandon their families in this way which also included confiscation of their property. Petronious himself ended in this way.

Fellini has given us a fascinating tryptych into a bygone era. In doing so, he also provides a remarkable journey into the myriad aspects of human life in all its richness.


I have recently been seeking a video or DVD as i still clearly remember seeing this film in 1972 in Sydney Australia. A superb movie provided by a genius of composing each frame. The series of strange characters that weaved in and out of the film. It is shortly being released on DVD in Australia and is a must see provided you are open to strange proceedings


Petronius' Satyricon, the inspiration for Fellini's masterful, albeit non-linear, eponymous film, has a good claim on being the first novel ever written. Unfortunately, Petronius' work was not transmitted to our day in anything even vaguely resembling a complete text. The chapters, or rather what are left of them, break off at inconvenient moments, sections are severely disjointed, transitions are non-existent, and so on. Fellini's adaptation is actually quite good.

Sextus Petronius, by all accounts the Emperor's minister of good taste, or arbiter elegantium, not only wrote a number of short poems and epigrams, but also committed suicide after being implicated in a plot against Nero. Petronius took his own life in much the same way that John Gielgud's Nerva did in Tinto Brass' 1979 film Caligula.

The linearity expected from contemporary film is absent in Satyricon, and rightly so. Instead of lamenting Fellini's seemingly poor control of the narrative, audiences should be applauding his triumph in bringing the full experience of this chaotic yet important film to the screen.

Fellini never made an 'easy' film; but to approach Satyricon without a modicum of serious preparation is setting oneself up for a severe disappointment. Read Petronius' surviving fragments before watching the film, and do not focus on the well known passages everyone has studied in Latin 101, instead consider the disjointed rhythms of the randomly fragmented narrative.