Capital Celluloid 2020 – Day 56: Tue Feb 25

Il Bidone (Fellini, 1955): BFI Southbank, NFT1, 6pm


This film, which is also being shown on February 28th and 29th, is part of the Federico Fellini season at BFI Southbank. Full details here.

Time Out review:
A pair of provincial con-men (Broderick Crawford and Richard Basehart) pose as priests to swindle ignorant peasant farmers, but what begins as comedy turns sour, cruel, and finally tragic. Characteristically, Fellini stacks the pack with a final victim of great facial beauty, palsied legs and obscurantist belief, after which it is only a matter of time before bad Brod receives his comeuppance on a stony hillside. Most of Fellini's preoccupations are present, but in 1955 had not yet blown the obligation to tell a story off-course.

Here (and above) is the trailer.

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