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Fellini - Satyricon
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Fellini - Satyricon (1969) More at IMDbPro »

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Overview

User Rating:
6.8/10   4,557 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Down 59% in popularity this week. See rank & trends on IMDbPro.
Director:
Federico Fellini
Writers:
Petronius (book)
Federico Fellini (writer) ...
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Contact:
View company contact information for Fellini Satyricon on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
11 March 1970 (USA) more
Tagline:
Rome. Before Christ. After Fellini.
Plot:
In first century Rome, two student friends, Encolpio and Ascilto, argue about ownership of the boy Gitone... more | full synopsis
Awards:
Nominated for Oscar. Another 5 wins & 2 nominations more
User Comments:
Visually Splendid--But Extremely Problematic more

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)
Martin Potter ... Encolpio

Hiram Keller ... Ascilto
Max Born ... Gitone
Salvo Randone ... Eumolpo
Mario Romagnoli ... Trimalcione (as Il Moro)
Magali Noël ... Fortunata
Capucine ... Trifena
Alain Cuny ... Lica
Fanfulla ... Vernacchio
Danika La Loggia ... Scintilla
Giuseppe Sanvitale ... Abinna
Genius ... Liberto arricchito
Lucia Bosé ... La matrona
Joseph Wheeler ... Il suicida
Hylette Adolphe ... La schiavetta
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Additional Details

Also Known As:
Fellini Satyricon (UK) (USA)
Satyricon (France) (International: English title) (short title)
The Degenerates
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Runtime:
128 min
Country:
Italy | France
Language:
Latin | Italian
Color:
Color (Technicolor)
Aspect Ratio:
2.35 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
When asked why both the leading roles were played by foreign actors and not Italians, Federico Fellini replied. "Because there are no Italian homosexuals." more
Quotes:
Soldier at Tomb: They've stolen the hanged man! While I was with you, the thief's family took him away! I know what punishment I'll get... a horrible death. Why should I wait for it? I'd rather die by my own hands.
[pulls his sword out and is about to stab himself]
Wife of Ephesus: [stops him] No! No, my dear... To lose the two men in my life, one after the other, would be too much...
Wife of Ephesus: [looks at the corpse of her husband] Better to hang a dead husband than to lose a living lover.
[the couple replace the missing hanged corpse with the corpse of her husband]
more
Movie Connections:
Referenced in Black Wine (2005) more

FAQ

This FAQ is empty. Add the first question.
42 out of 64 people found the following comment useful:-
Visually Splendid--But Extremely Problematic, 8 April 2005
7/10
Author: gftbiloxi (gftbiloxi@yahoo.com) from Biloxi, Mississippi

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

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Message Boards

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Recent Posts (updated daily)User
Richard Simmons is in this movie ? ? ? ? ? ? Marcholio81
Movies Influenced by Satyricon ebm83
C'mon everyone, it's not that good really... cardronaseasonpass
great movie about ancient rome alccls
i like watching this without reading the subtitles hypemankenny
Criterion Release bws-2
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