Italian film director and writer, whose most famous films include La Strada (1955), La Dolce Vita (1960), and 8 1/2 (1963). Fellini began his career as a cartoonist, journalist, and scriptwriter. Marcello Mastroianni played in several films Fellini's male alter ego, and Giulietta Masina, Fellini's wife, was known as the director's anima, feminine side. Typical for Fellini's films is carnivalesque style and constantly shifting boundary between illusion, studio-built artificiality, and reality. Once he remarked, "I make pictures to tell a story, to tell lies and to amuse." Although Fellini opposed in principle literary adaptations and wrote all his scripts, he used works from such writers as Edgar Allan Poe (Tre Passi del delirio), Petronius (Satyricon), and Casanova. Four of Fellini's movies won Oscars for best foreign-language film.

"Everyone lives in his own fantasy world, but most people don't understand that. No one perceives the real world. Each person simply call his private, personal fantasies the Truth. The difference is that I know I live in a fantasy world. I prefer it that way and resent anything that disturbs my vision." (Fellini in I, Fellini, ed. by Charlotte Chandler, 1995)

Federico Fellini was born in Rimini into a middle-class family. Rimini later became the setting of I Vitelloni (1953) and Amarcord (1973), dealing with the director's adolescence during the Fascist era. For some reason, Mussolini felt antipathy towards Rimini itself, although the town of Riccione became the dictator's favorite beach destination. Fellini's father, Urbano, was a traveling salesman of coffee and other grocery specialties. Ida, Fellini's mother, came from an established Roman family.

At school Fellini was an average schoolboy but demonstrated his talents in drawing. He was also interested in the circus and according to one story, which he invented, he ran away from home at the age of seven to follow a traveling circus. Fellini drew characters for his own puppet theater and put on shows, where he played all parts. The circus become in his films the perfect manifestation of popular entertainment, its innocence and vulgarity. Dario Fo, the Italian playwright and director, saw clowns "synonymous with puerile simple-mindedness, with picture-postcard ingenuousness, and with sheer sentimentality." For Fellini the clown had been earlier "the caricature of a well-established, ordered, peaceful society," but later in life he felt that the clown is dying, and asked: "Who can still laugh at clown? ... All the world plays a clown now." In 1970 Fellini made for RAI, the Italian national television and radio monopoly, The Clowns, which become a personal film essay about the spirit of the clown.

In 1938 Fellini went to Florence to study at the university, but then continued to Rome, where he enrolled at the University of Rome's law school. Instead of attending classes he worked for the newspaper Il Popolo di Roma, drew cartoons, and wrote short stories for the humorous magazine Marc' Aurelio. Fellini never frequented the film clubs and later, when he was asked to recount the fifty films he loved the most, he said: "Fifty films! Are you kidding? I never saw that many in my entire life!" During the early war years Fellini managed to stay out of the army but in 1943 he was declared fit for military service. However, Fellini's military records were apparently destroyed in a bombing and he continued writing for radio in Rome.

In 1943 Fellini met Giulietta Masina, whom he married after a four-month courtship. Masina had gained success as the co-star of Cico e Pallina, a show about a young married couple scripted by Fellini. For a period he worked on the movie I cavalieri del deserto (Knights of the Desert) in Libya, but had a lucky escape before the Allied forces seized control of Tripoli.

After the liberation of Rome opened The Funny Face Shop with his friends, and drew caricatures of American G.I.s. Through his friend the actor Aldo Fabrizi, he met Roberto Rosselini, and collaborated with him as a screenwriter in Roma Città aperta (1945), a founding work of neorealism. He was also an assistant director on Paisà (1946). With the director Alberto Larruada he collaborated in Luci del Varietà (1951), which was based on Fellini's story.

Fellini's first solo effort as a director was the semi-autobiographical film Lo Sceicco bianco (1952, The White Sheik). It was a critical and commercial failure, but started the long collaboration with the playwright Tullio Pinelli, the scriptwriter Ennio Flaiano (1910-1972), and the composer Nino Rota (1911-1979). With I Vitelloni, a tale of tale of aimless young men, Fellini made his international breakthrough.

Fellini began as a neo-realist but gradually he developed his special imaginative, surrealistic vision of the world. His partnership with Tullio Pinelli (1908-2009) produced some of his most famous films, such as I Vitelloni, La Strada, La Dolce Vita and 8 ½.

La Strada was a version of the fairy tale Beauty and the Beast. "You're not going to believe me... yet everything in this world is useful for something", says Matto (Richard Basehart) to Masina, who played the simple-minded, childish Gelsomina. She loves beauty and is terrorized by her brutish husband, Zampano, a strongman. After her death Zampano has nothing. "Fellini's direction left a great deal to be desired," wrote Diana Willing in Films in Review (August/September, 1956). Although writers changed, Fellini did not receive much understanding in the magazine. Nino Rota's theme song for the film sold more than two million copies in Italy – Rota's long association with Fellini had started in The White Sheik. In the United States La Strada was chosen by the Motion Picture Academy as Best Foreign Film of 1956. Fellini described the film as "the complete catalogue of my entire mythological world." The films tragic qualities and bleak consistency owe much to the style of the cinematographer Otello Martelli, who collaborated with Fellini on four subsequent productions.

Le notti di Cabiria (1957) won Fellini his second Academy Award. "As a motion picture Cabiria is of no consequence, but sociologically it could have utility as an illustration of how sick Europe is", noted L.C. in Films in Review (December, 1957).

La Dolce Vita (1960) won the Grand Prize at the 1961 Cannes Festival. It opened with a huge statue of Jesus, which is moved by a helicopter above the rooftops of Rome. In another famous scene Anita Ekberg walks through Trevi Fountain. Marcello Mastroianni is a gossip columnist who wants to be a serious writer, but he cannot escape the decadent high society life in Rome. Instead of shooting on the famous Via Veneto, Fellini created his own version of the street at the Cinecittà studios. Henry Hart, who did not share the enthusiasm of other reviewers called the film a "three-hour peep-show – a carelessly written and directed hodge-podge of skits depicting some of the follies of contemporary Western civilization..." (in Films in Review (June/July, 1961) The success of the film enabled Fellini to form his own production company, named Federiz.

Otto e Mezzo (1963, 8 1/2), about the conflict between commerce and art, won the best foreign film Oscar. Marcello Mastroianni in the role of Guido Anselmi, a filmmaker, who has made precisely the same number of films as Fellini - 8 1/2. "With Fellini I feel like a friend, not an actor," Mastroianni once said. Guido is on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and at the end is left without any clear idea what to do next. In the Soviet Union the film won a first prize at the Moscow Film Festival. All reviews were not positive. "... incidents of fact. dream, fantasy, and imagination strung together without reason and without art", wrote Helen Weldon Kuhn wrote (in Films in Review, August/September, 1963). Giulietta degli Spiriti (1965, Juliet of the Spirits) was Fellini's first color feature, a story of dreams, spirits, and loneliness. Andrew Sarris in Village Voice (November 11&18, 1965) did not like the film: "As it turned out, Fellini missed by a mile, and I am sorry that I must write this review more in sorrow than anger, but Juliet is barely slick enough to pass as middlebrow entertainment on the Rose Franzblau level."

Fellini had read Petronius Arbiter's Satyricon already at school. The author lived in the times of Nero, and was regarded as director-in-chief of the imperial pleasures. Satyricon was a comic romance about Encolpius, who has lost his potence but hopes to regain it again. His companion is a pretty boy, Giton, with whom he is in love. Encolpius's rival is Ascyltus. Fellini made the screenplay with Bernardino Zapponi, without being too much faithful to the original source. A major exception was the famous dinner at the villa of Trimalchio, filmed in Cinecittà, where Fellini Satyricon (1969) become the most expensive film since Ben-Hur. Satyricon, called a "procession of wild orgies", continued the themes of decadence and impotence of La Dolce Vita and 8 1/2. The film did well in Italy and France.

Amarcod, a nostalgic and visionary journey into the director's memories of his youth, was awarded with best foreign film Oscar. Fellini recreated his imaginary Rimini in Cinecittà. In one magic scene people in small boats greet enthusiastically a painted ship, which disappears in the fog. The cinematographer Giuseppe Rotunno shot three more films for Fellini, from Casanova (1976) up to E la Nave va (1983).

Casanova, starring Donald Sutherland in a false nose and chin, received mixed critics. The American writer Gore Vidal worked some time with the script, but Fellini did not like the changes he made in the story. La Città delle Donne (1980, City of Women) and Casanova failed at the box office, and also E la Nave va (And the Ship Sails On) did not encourage bankers to finance Fellini's movies. Although Fellini had refused to make commercials, he made one for the apéritif, Campari, in 1984. The nostalgic Ginger and Fred (1985), starring Giulietta Masina and Marcello Mastroianni, was a homage to small-time entertainers. Marina was a retired tap dancer who is reunited with her former dance partner and lover for a Christmas television special.

Fascinated by the work of the Peruvian writer and anthropologist Carlos Castaneda, Fellini planned to make a film about shamans, legends, and rituals of the ancient Aztecs. After many fruitless attempts to get in touch with Castaneda, he began to suspect that the author didn't really exist. When they finally met in Rome, Fellini was disappointed. He found nothing in Castaneda's stocky physical appearance to suggest that he's a shaman or initiated. Nevertheless, Fellini made a trip to Mexico, where a native shaman got him involved in a ritual, in which he saw hallucinations. Castaneda had recommened that the director never try peyote, because "considering how much he ate, it would be disastrous." Fellini's screenplay, entitled Viaggio a Tulun, was adapted by the noted Italian cartoonist Milo Manera as Viaggio a Tulum and published in the magazine Corto Maltese in 1989. 

Intervista (1987), which was awarded a Special Prize at Cannes, marked Fellini's last appearance in feature film. At the 1992 Academy Awards he received a Lifetime Achievement Award. Federico Fellini died of cardiac arrest on October 31, 1993 at the Umberto I Hospital in Rome, after having choked a piece of food while dining in a restaurant. His corpse was transferred to Rimi where he was buried in the family tomb.

For further reading: Federico Fellini: His Life and Work by Tullio Kezich (2006); Federico Fellini: Contemporary Perspectives, ed. by Frank Burke & Marguerite R. Waller (2002); The Films of Federico Fellini by Peter E. Bondanella (2002); Federico Fellini by Fabrizio Borin & Bjarne S. Funch (2000); Conversations With Fellini, ed. by Costanzo Costantini (1997); Fellini's Films: From Postwar to Postmodern by Frank Burke (1996); I, Fellini, ed. by Charlotte Chandler (1995); The Cinema of Federico Fellini by Peter Bondanella (1992); Federico Fellini: Comments on Film, ed. by Giovanni Grazzini (1988); Fellini: A Life by Hollis Alpert (1986); The Films of Federico Fellini by Claudio G. Fava (1985); Caro Federico by Sandra Milo (1982); Fellini by Sonia Schoonejans (1980); Federico Fellini: A Guide to References and Resources by John C. Stubbs (1978); Federico Fellini by Gilbert Salachas (1977); Fellini by Liliana Betti (1976); Federico Fellini: The Search for a New Mythology by Charles B. Ketcham (1976); The Cinema of Federico Fellini by Stuart Rosenthal (1976); Fellini on Fellini by Federico Fellini (1974); Fellini by Angelo Solmi (1968); Fellini by Suzanne Budgen (1966)

Books:

• La strada, sceneggiatura, 1955 (with Tullio Pinelli)
  
• La dolce vita, 1959 (edited by Tullio Kezich)
  - La dolce vita (English translation by Oscar DeLiso and Bernard Shir-Cliff, 1961)
  
• Giulietta degli spiriti di Federico Fellini, 1965
  - Juliet of the Spirits (edited by Tullio Kezich; translated from the Italian by Howard Greenfeld, 1965)
  
• La mia Rimini, 1967 (with others, edited by Renzo Renzi)
  
• Fellini Satyricon di Federico Fellini, 1969
  - Fellini’s Satyricon (edited by Dario Zanelli and translated by Eugene Walter and John Matthews, 1970)
  
• Three Screenplays: I vitelloni. Il bidone. The temptations of Doctor Antonio, 1970 (translated from the Italian by Judith Green)
• Early Screenplays: Variety Lights, The White Sheik, 1971 (translated from the Italian by Judith Green)
  
• Fellini TV. Block-notes di un regista. I clowns, 1972 (edited by Renzo Renzi)
  
• Roma, 1972
  
• Amarcord, 1973
  
• Quattro film, 1974
  
• Casanova: sceneggiatura originale, 1976 (with Bernardino Zapponi)
  - Fellini’s Casanova (in collaboration with Bernardino Zapponi; translated from the Italian by Claudia Cremasco, 1997)
  
• Fellini on Fellini, 1976 (edited by Anna Keel and Christian Strich; translated by Isabel Quigly)
  
• Il Casanova, 1977 (edited by Gianfranco Angelucci and Liliana Bett)
  
• I Vitelloni: (Die Müssiggänger), 1977 (with Tullio Pinelli and Ennio Flaiano)
• Fare un film, 1980
• Prova d’orchestra, 1980
  
• Lo sceicco bianco, 1980 (edited by Oreste Del Buono)
  
• La città delle donne, 1980 (edited by Liliana Betti)
  
• Fellini’s Faces: Vierhundertachtzehn Bilder aus Federico Fellini’s Fotoarchiv, 1981 (edited by Christian Strich)
  - Fellini’s Faces: 418 Pictures from the Photo-archives of Federico Fellini (edited by Christian Strich; with a foreword by R.D. Laing; and an introduction by Federico Fellini; translation by Chantal d’Aulnis, 1982)
  
• Intervista sul cinema, 1983 (edited by Giovanni Grazzini)
  - Comments on Film (edited by Giovanni Grazzini; translation by Joseph Henry, 1988)
  
• Moraldo in the City; and, A Journey with Anita, 1983 (edited and translated by John C. Stubbs)
  
• Ginger e Fred: rendiconto di un film, 1986 (edited by Mino Guerrini) 
  
• Un regista a Cinecittà, 1988
  - Cinecittà (translated by Graham Fawcett, 1989)
  
• Block-notes di un regista, 1988 (afterword by Jacqueline Risset)
  
• Giulietta, 1989 (published by Diogenes Verlag AG, Zürich)
  - Giulietta: kertomus (suom. Eija Pokkinen, 1989)
  
• La voce della luna, 1990 (edited by Lietta Tornabuoni)
  
• Federico Fellini, 1994
  
• Imago: appunti di un visionario, 1994 (with Toni Maraini)
  
• Il mestiere di regista: intervista con Federico Fellini, 1994 (with Rita Cirio)
• Il viaggio di G. Mastorna, 1995 (introduction by Tullio Kezich) 
  
• Fellini on Fellini, 1995 (edited by Costanzo Costantini; translated by Sohrab Sorooshian)
  
• Fellini on Fellini, 1996 (translated from the Italian by Isabel Quigley)
  
• Il mio amico Pasqualino, 1997 (foreword by Beniamino Placido)
  
• Federico Fellini & Dario Fo: disegni geniali, 1999
  
• Fellini: parole e disegni, 2000 (edited by Vincenzo Mollica)
  - Fellini: Words and Drawings (collected by Vincenzo Mollica; translated by Nina Marino, 2001)
  
• Il corpo, gli interni, la città nell’opera grafica di Federico Fellini, 2002 (edited by Giuseppe Ricci and Marco Bertozzi)
  
• I’m a Born Liar: A Fellini Lexicon, 2003 (edited by Damian Pettigrew)
• La mia Rimini = Rimini, my home town = Rimini, mes racines, 2003 (foreword and afterword by Sergio Zavoli; edited by Mario Guaraldi, Loris Pellegrini)
  
• Federico Fellini: segni di cinema: 50 disegni 1954-1993, 2004 (edited by Ferruccio Giromini)
  
• Racconti umoristici: "Marc’Aurelio," 1939-1942, 2004 (edited by Claudio Carabba)
  
• Federico Fellini: Interviews, 2006 (edited by Bert Cardullo)
  
• Il libro dei sogni, 2007 (edited by Tullio Kezich and Vittorio Boarini)
  - The Book of Dreams  (edited by Tullio Kezich and Vittorio Boarini; with a contribution from Vincenzo Mollica, 2008)
  
• Ciò che abbiamo inventato è tutto autentico: lettere a Tullio Pinelli, 2008 (edited by Augusto Sainati)
  
• L’arte della visione, 2009 (with Goffredo Fofi and Gianni Volpi; photographs by Paul Ronald)
  
• T/12: Fellini di segni e di sogni, 2009 (introduction byVittorio Boarini)
  

Films:

• Lo vedi come sei?, 1939 (co-screenwriter, gags)
• Il Pirata sono io, 1940 (co-screenwriter, gags only)
• Non me lo dire, 1940 (co-screenwriter, gags only)
• Lo vedi come sei?, 1940 (co-screenwriter, gags only)
• Avanti c'è Posto, 1942 (co-screenwriter, story only)
• Documento z-3, 1942 (co-screenwriter)
• Quarta Pagina, 1942 (co-screenwriter)
• Campo dè Fiori, 1943 (co-screenwriter, story only)
• Apparizione, 1943 (co-screenwriter)
• L'Ultima Carrozella, 1943 (co-screenwriter, story only)
• Chi l'ha visto?, 1943 (co-screenwriter)
• Roma Città aperta, 1945 - Rome, Open City (co-screenwriter, also asst. director)
• Paisà, 1946 - Paisan (co-screenwriter, also asst. director, dir. by Roberto Rosselini)
• Il Delitto di Giovanni Episcopo, 1947 - Flesh Will Surrender (co-screenwriter, dir. by Alberto Lattuada)
• L'Ebreo errante, 1947 - The Wandering Jew (co-screenwriter, uncredited)
• Il Passatore, 1947 - A Bullet for Stefano (co-screenwriter)
• Senza Pietà, 1948 - Without Pity (co-screenwriter)
• L'Amore, 1948 - Love (dir. by Roberto Rosselini, co-screenwriter, story of Il Miracolo, also act.)
• Il Nome della legge, 1949 (co-screenwriter, also asst. dir.)
• Il Mulino del Po, 1949 - The Mill on the Po (co-screenwriter, also asst. dir., dir. by Alberto Lattuada; based on a novel by Riccardo Bacchelli)
• La Città dolente, 1949 (co-screenwriter)
• Francesco - Giullare di Dio, 1950 - Flowers of St. Francis (co-screenwriter, also asst. dir., dir. by Roberto Rosselini)
• Il Cammino della Speranza, 1950 - The Path of Hope (co-screenwriter, also asst. dir.)
• Persiane chiuse, 1951 (co-screenwriter, also asst. dir.)
• La Città si difende, 1951 (co-screenwriter, also asst. dir.)
• Cameriera bella presenza offresi, 1951 (co-screenwriter)
• Luci del Varietà, 1951 - Variety Lights (co-dir. with Alberto Lattuada, starring Peppino De Filippo, Carla Del Poggio, Giulietta Masina)
• Europa '51, 1952 - The Greatest Love (co-screenwriter, uncredited, dir. by Roberto Rosselini)
• Lo Sceicco bianco, 1952 - The White Sheik (dir., starring Brunella Bovo, Leopoldo Trieste, Alberto Sordi)
• Il Brigante di Tacca del Lupo, 1952 (co-screenwriter, co-story, asst. dir. only)
• Cameriera Bella Presenza Offresi, 1952 (co-screenwriter)
• I Vitelloni, 1953 - The Loafers (dir., starring Franco Interlenghi, Alberto Sordi, Franco Fabrizi)
• Amore in Città, 1953 - Love in the City (dir., episode Un' Agenzia matrimoniale)
• La Strada, 1954 - The Road (dir., starring Giulietta Masina, Anthony Quinn, Richard Basehart)
• Il Bidone, 1955 - The Swindle (dir., starring Broderick Crawford, Franco Fabrizi, Richard Basehart)
• Le Notti di Cabiria, 1957 - The Nights of Cabiria (dir., starring Giulietta Masina, Francois Périer, Amadeo Nazzari)
• Fortunella, 1958 (co-screenwriter)
• La Dolce Vita, 1960 (dir., starring Marcello Mastroianni, Anouk Aimée, Adriana Moneta, Anita Ekberg)
• Boccaccio '70, 1962 (episode Le Tentazioni di Dottor Antonio / The Temptation of Dr. Antonio)
• Otto e Mezzo, 1963 - 8 1/2 (dir., starring Marcello Mastroianni, Claudia Cardinale, Anouk Aimée, Sandra Milo)
• Giulietta degli Spiriti, 1965 - Juliet of the Spirits (dir., starring Giulietta Masina, Mario Pisu, Caterina Boratto)
• Histoires extraordinares, 1968 - Spirits of the Dead (episode Toby Dammit / Never Bet the Devil Your Head, loosely based on E.A. Poe's short story 'Never Bet the Devil Your Head')
• Fellini Satyricon, 1969 (dir., starring Martin Potter, Hiram Keller, Max Born, Capucine, freely adapted from the Satyricon of Petronius Arbiter)
• Block-notes di un regista, 1969 - Fellini: A Director's Notebook (dir., screenplay; with F.F. Giulietta Masina, Marcello Mastroianni, Marina Boratto, Caterina Boratto) 
• I Clowns, 1970 - The Clowns (dir., made for Italian TV)
• Roma, 1972 - Fellini's Roma (dir., starring Fellini, Peter Gonzales, Britta Barnes, Pia de Doses)
• Amarcord, 1973 - I Remember (dir., starring Bruno Zanin, Pupella Maggio, Armando Brancia)
• Casanova, 1976 - Fellini's Casanova (dir., starring Donald Sutherland,, Tina Aumont, Cicely Browne, freely based on Giacomo Casanova's The Story of My Life)
• Prova d'Orchestra, 1979 - Orchestra Rehearsal (dir., starring Baldwin Baas, Clara Colosimo, Elizabeth Labi)
• La Città delle Donne, 1980 - City of Women (dir., starring Marcello Mastoianni, Anna Prucnal, Bernice Stegers)
• E la Nave va, 1983 - And the Ship Sails On (dir., starring Freddie Jones, Barbara Jefford, Victor Poletti, Peter Cellier)
• Ginger e Fred, 1985 - Ginger and Fred (dir., starring Giulietta Masina, Marcello Mastroianni, Franco Fabrizi)
• Intervista, 1987 - Interview (dir., starring Sergio Rubini, Paola Liguori, Maurizio Mein, Nadia Ottaviani, Anita Ekberg, Federico Fellini, Marcello Mastroianni)
• La Voce della Luna, 1990 - The Voices of the Moon (dir., starring Roberto Benigni, Paolo Villaggio, Nadia Ottaviani, based on a story by Ermanno Cavazzoni from Poema dei lunatici)