The Clowns (1970)

Director: Federico Fellini

Screenplay: Federico Fellini and Bernardino Zapponi

Cast: Federico Fellini as Himself and a cast of real life clowns

Synopsis: In his childhood, recreated for this TV movie that is a hybrid between fiction and documentary, the legendary director Federico Fellini recounts being taken to the circus as a child only to be frightened by the clowns. Having a lasting effect, he with his motley production crew tour around Italy and France exploring the history of some of the greatest professional clowns to have ever existed, intermixing their histories with recreations by the newest generations of clowns.

In the midst of his golden period of filmmaking Fellini made The Clowns. He'd become a recognisable name even in the USA by this point, having already become a legend with films like La Dolce Vita (1960) and entering his hyper surreal and dream influenced era with Juliet of the Spirits (1965). By the point of The Clowns, he was moving on to be the Italian maestro whose name would be put in the title of his productions (Satyricon (1969) and Roma (1972)). Here, able to make this television movie, he recreates an incident where clowns traumatised him as a child and, coming as an adult with a longing to fully appreciate and admire their craft, creates a document dealing with their history. After the elaborate prologue, which feels like a prelude to the likes of Amarcord (1973), which shows child Fellini seeing a circus tent being erected outside his window, and the trauma he'd have with said clowns, what you get is an unconventional hybrid.

Whilst it's not as unconventional as Orson Welles' F For Fake (1973), it's the perfect comparison as the tag of "documentary" comes off as a joke itself when The Clowns defies and flaunts being an actual document, with the crew characters themselves, cameos from the likes of Anita Ekberg, and culminating into countless recreations and performances in a circus ring by clowns. It gleefully undercuts the border between truth and recreation fully, Fellini the director and the character within his own film grabbing together a crew, including the comically underappreciated female assistant, to begin an escapade to learn of the history of clowning in Italy and France. "Escapade" is perfect as the level of mirth on display if infectious, the film artificial and Fellini playing as jokes with real former clowns as characters playing themselves, and yet discussing their lives and craft even in the midst of this. Willing, as the symbolic moment of the entire film itself, to have a bucket land over his mid-speech for a one shot joke. If it's all true, and hasn't been lying like Orson Welles was in F For Fake, it's a fascinating take at a dying art, going into the past with clown archetypes of yore examined. Tipping the hat to legends, it's a noble task, cutting to recreations of these clowns by new disciples of face paint and slapstick who stand out as well.

From https://theleastpictureshow.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/clowns-1.jpg

Fellini at this point was exceptionally indulgent, the discovery of Carl Jung and the esoteric permanently changing his cinema after 1965. Even when fantasy appeared in the likes of 8½ (1963), and overblown spectacle matched by his stand-in Marcello Mastroianni getting a space rocket launch built for his next feature, it tipped over the edge further mid-sixties onwards. I was once not a huge fan as a younger and dumber viewer to these later spectacles, though I still sympathise with those who'd agree with my younger self arguing his later work leaves one with cinematic indigestion, especially if one is not used to Fellini's style. For me now, older and smarter, and able to digest said style fully, I now adore it and am amazed he was able to get away with some of the sights you see in these films. Even on a TV budget, Fellini gets away with a lot even in the "normal" scenes for The Clowns, deliberately staged. Anita Ekberg playing herself can cameo to pose around big cat cages at the circus whilst legendary French actor/director/former clown Pierre Étaix, obscurer in English speaking worlds but a significant figure in his homeland, has a segment as himself where his recorded film from his own clowning family's past sadly burns up in the projector. In neither case, as with any appearance, is the film trying to be real document in the slightest which deliberately undermines the viewer's sense of reality. Even if real facts are on display, it's a very interesting viewing experience when the film's presentation gleefully undercuts the notion of documented verisimilitude.

All playful, entirely irrelevant. Utterly unconventional as it still maintains absolute respect for the clowns themselves, a sadness felt as a circus which had its own building became a beer hall after the decades past. The sense that clowning will become lesser appreciated, more so nowadays, is more enforced as even on the cusp of the seventies The Clowns talks of it being forgotten. In the modern era the likes of Stephen King's It, coulrophobia is a more known idea and the bizarre phenomena that was the 2016 evil clown sightings, really cruel jokes that got out of hand in multiple countries with people dressing as clowns and frightening members of the public, didn't help in the slightest. But it really makes a startling reminder, even in this humorous tribute, that by the seventies clowning was seen as antiquated by this film's viewpoint. That a lot of its figures, the archetypes of clowns and those who donned their face paint in real life, vary from before the 20th century to before the 1950s really does emphasise how old a profession it is. In The Clown's testament, it makes itself a real document by just talking about the subject matter in detail.

From http://images3.static-bluray.com/reviews/5065_1.jpg

The clowns here are not creepy Its either, not even the mainstream examples like Ronald McDonald, but an old profession with a real, tangible history to it untainted at this point by crass commercialisation. To those of the clowning profession reading this review, or if you the reader know any as friends or relatives, The Clowns is absolutely rewarding just for the clowning sequences themselves, which become the most unconventional aspect of the entire film. Farces in a circus ring where all manner of surreal gags involving their exaggerated movements and props, on and off themselves, entertain us the viewer. Some assistance are helped by the power of cinema, but most of what is seen is likely what would be performed on stage, and they are bizarre. Fellini, in one of the odder moment very early on, has a montage of various types of public figures drawn very likely from his own childhood, from gossipers to members of the fascistic Italian office, portrayed as pure caricatures to show that the clowns themselves usually took inspiration from the manners of real people, their exaggerations given context in a very inspired and clever inclusion on his part. Taken to its most extreme is when, lamenting the tragedy of clowning's failing fortunes, the film ends on a literal clown funeral. It is arguably one of the standout sequences in any Fellini film, a mad scenario between clowns lamenting the loss of their friend and also prating around or the carriage driver arguing with one of his own horses. Eventually it goes on so long clowns start to have to bow out in exhaustion, a feverish end for a high note. Certainly a  stand out as a big sequence within the director's career.

Abstract Spectrum: Delirious/Eccentric/Expressionist

Abstract Rating (High/Medium/Low/None): Low

Personal Opinion:

An obscure but rewarding entry in Fellini's career. Certainly a film I have immense interest in for him and my ongoing obsession with anything involving circuses and carnivals. Also in term of his career, The Clowns is not only a great film by itself but a very interesting prelude to his later work. I can see when he jumped away from conventional narrative structure with this film, and the breaking down of features into vignettes and segments interlinked is certainly see here more than the work of the sixties. So it's also a good film to find to bridge to the likes of Amarcord too.

From http://www.emiliodoc.it/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/clowns8.jpg