Marcello Mastroianni – The Great Hero
He may well be called Europe’s great hero—though certainly not of mainstream celluloid. He was the great hero of art cinema. For more than fifty years he stood, in his own right, as Europe’s representative figure. In the court of world cinema, among the few actors who left a permanent mark, Marcello Mastroianni remains one. As an icon, he is the very emblem of cinema’s intellectual tradition. Visconti, Blasetti, Fellini, Antonioni, Angelopoulos—Europe’s most renowned filmmakers discovered in him the distilled essence of European manhood. In Europe’s darkest hours of crisis, Mastroianni became its hero. In his performances, the anguish of the age, its doubts, anger, grief, despair—all found visible form. Fellini declared that the face of this introspective actor was none other than the mirror of Europe’s collective self-consciousness. It was Fellini’s La Dolce Vita that first gave Mastroianni international fame. In early life he acted on stage, and during his days of impris...