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About the Book:

The definitive book on the life and films of Federico Fellini

With the revolutionary 8 1/2, Federico Fellini put his deepest desires and anxieties before the lens in 1963, permanently impacting the art of cinema in the process. Now, more than forty years later, film critic and Fellini confidant Tullio Kezich has written the work by which all other biographies of the filmmaker are sure to be measured. In this revealing account of a lifetime spent in pictures, Kezich uses his friendship with Fellini as a means to step outside the frame of myth and anecdote that surrounds him — much, it turns out, of the director's own making.

A great lover of women and a meticulous observer of dreams, Fellini, perhaps more than any other director of the twentieth century, created films that embodied a thoroughly modern sensibility, eschewing traditional narrative along with religious and moral precepts. His is an art of delicate pathos, of episodic films that directly address the intersection of reality, fantasy, and desire that exists as a product of mid-century Italy — a country reeling from a Fascist regime as it struggled with an outmoded Catholic national identity. As Kezich reveals, the dilemmas Fellini presents in his movies reflect not only his personal battles but those of Italian society. The result is a book that explores both the machinations of cinema and the man who most grandly embraced the full spectrum of its possibilities, leaving his indelible mark on it forever.

What people say:

"A loving, passionate, wonderfully detailed, and exquisitely written look at one of the few truly indispensable film artists who have come our way, from one of the people who knew him and his films best. I can't think of a better companion piece to the incomparable work of Federico Fellini." — Martin Scorsese

"Both an outsider (Kezich is one of the best, if not the best Italian film critic) and an insider (as screenwriter, playwright, and occasionally producer) Tullio Kezich was in the ideal position to write the best biography of Fellini, an analytical study of his work combined with the story of his relationship to Italian cinema and society. Kezich's forty year friendship with the maestro allows him to offer up an intimate and lively portrait of Fellini filled with revealing anecdotes and psychological insight." — Michel Ciment, author of Kubrick and Kazan on Kazan

"Trenchant in its critical analysis, engrossing and sympathetic in its account of his private life, Tullio Kezich's definitive biography of Fellini is a revelation. It effaces virtually everything written to date about the Italian maestro. Kezich's intimate knowledge of the man and his work is quite simply peerless." — Peter Cowie, author of Coppola and Revolution! The Explosion of World Cinema in the Sixties

"An extraordinary book that gives the reader a personal insight into the life and the career of one of the purest geniuses of cinema from the invaluable perspective of a close friend and a great film critic ." — Antonio Monda, Professor of Italian Cinema, New York University

About the Author:

Tullio Kezich (1928 – 2009) was an Italian film critic, screenwriter, playwright and actor. Recognized as a world specialist on Federico Fellini, he was also a playwright, whose works have been performed throughout Europe.