Last scene of 8 1/2 by Fellini
The script critic celebrating Guido's decision of not shoot the movie ->
You've made the right choice.
Believe me, today
is a good day for you.
These are tough decisions, I know.
But we intellectuals, and I say we
because I consider you such,
must remain lucid to the bitter end.
This life is so full of confusion already,
that there's no need
to add chaos to chaos.
Losing money is part
of a producer's job.
I congratulate you.
You had no choice.
And he got what he deserved,
for having joined such a frivolous
venture so lightheartedly.
Believe me, no need for remorse.
Destroying is better than creating
when we're not creating those few,
truly necessary things.
But then is there anything
so clear and right
that it deserves to live in this world?
For him, the wrong movie
is only a financial matter.
But for you, at this point,
it could have been the end.
Better to quit
and strew the ground with salt,
as the ancients did,
to purify the battlefields.
In the end what we need is...
some hygiene, some cleanliness,
disinfection.
We're smothered by images,
words and sounds
that have no right to exist, coming
from, and bound for, nothingness.
0f any artist truly worth the name
we should ask nothing
except this act of faith: to learn silence.
Do you remember Mallarmé's
homage to the white page?
And Rimbaud...
...a poet, my friend, not a movie director.
What was his finest poetry?
His refusal to continue writing
and his departure for Africa.
If we can't have everything,
true perfection is nothingness.
Forgive me for quoting all the time.
But we critics... do what we can.
0ur true mission is... sweeping away
the thousands of miscarriages
that everyday... obscenely...
try to come to the light.
And you would actually dare leave
behind you a whole film,
like a cripple who leaves behind
his crooked footprint.
Such a monstrous presumption
to think
that others could benefit from the
squalid catalogue of your mistakes!
And how do you benefit
from stringing together
the tattered pieces of your life?
Your vague memories, the faces of people
that you were never able to love...
Guido ->
What is this sudden happiness
that makes me tremble,
giving me strength, life?
Forgive me, sweet creatures.
I hadn't understood. I didn't know.
It's so natural accepting you,
loving you.
And so simple.
Luisa, I feel I've been freed.
Everything seems so good,
so meaningful.
Everything is true.
I wish I could explain.
But I don't know how to.
So. Everything is confused again,
as it was before.
The lights!
But this confusion is... me.
Not as I'd like to be, but as I am.
I'm not afraid anymore
of telling the truth,
of the things I don't know,
what I'm looking for and haven't found.
This is the only way I can feel alive
and I can look into your faithful
eyes without shame.
Life is a celebration.
Let's live it together!
This is all I can say Luisa,
to you or the others.
Accept me for what I am,
if you want me.
It's the only way we might be able
to find each other.
Luisa ->
I don't know if what
you said to me is right.
But I can try if you help me.
