THE WHITE SHEIK

Fellini undoubtedly made better films but his solo debut, "The White Sheik", is still one of his most enjoyable, (he had already co-directed "Lights of Variety" with Alberto Lattuada, perhaps because he was poking fun at something he knew very well, show-business and play-acting for the camera, and for Fellini show-business was always fun. Even when he was at his most 'serious' he could never quite take life seriously. Performers were everywhere; even his prostitutes were performers of a kind and here, The White Sheik of the title, is as flamboyant a performer as ever graced a Fellini film.

He's played by Alberto Sordi as a broad, narcissistic buffoon but Fellini showers him with affection. He's his own hero though the film's hero is actually the stuffy little bureaucrat, (beautifully played by Leopoldo Trieste), who has come to Rome on his honeymoon and whose wife our White Sheik sets out to seduce but who emerges from her encounters dimmer than a fading light bulb and purer than the driven snow. Here is comedy both broad and satirical. Watch out, too, for Giulietta Masina as a little streetwalker named Cabiria. Fame, for Mrs. Fellini, was just around the corner.