8½ (F. Fellini, 1963)

8½‘s title refers to it being Fellini’s eighth and a half film as a director. His previous directorial work consisted of six features, two short segments, and a collaboration with another director, Alberto Lattuada, the latter three treated as “half” films. The plot concerns a director (played by Marcello Mastroianni) who suffers from stifled creativity as he attempts to direct an epic science fiction film.

8½ is about the struggles involved in the creative process, both technical and personal, and the problems artists face when expected to deliver something personal and profound with intense public scrutiny, on a constricted schedule, while simultaneously having to deal with their own personal relationships. It is, in a larger sense, about finding a sense of meaning in life despite its being difficult and fragmented. Like several Italian films of the period (most evident in the films of Fellini’s contemporary, Michelangelo Antonioni), 8½ also is about the alienating effects of modernisation.

(Source : en.wikipedia.org)