"Thank you, see you soon"; Scorsese's account of the last phone call with Federico Fellini

In the new documentary "The Last Fellini", Martin Scorsese recalls his last phone conversation with Federico Fellini, the famous Italian filmmaker; A short and touching conversation in which Fellini tells Scorsese, "Thank you, see you soon."

Safir Arjan: This documentary, directed by Gianluigi Attore, is about the last decade of Fellini's life and will be shown for the first time at the Rome Film Festival on Saturday. The Italian companies Atomic and Rai Cinema are in charge of producing it, and Piperplay has acquired the international rights to sell the film. Scorsese, who is a staunch admirer of Fellini, has repeatedly cited "Eighty Ninety One" as one of his all-time favorites, and his film foundation has also contributed to the restoration of Fellini's masterpiece, "The Sweet Life."

According to Variety, despite the many things that have been written about Fellini, the last years of his life have been less explored. The documentary "The Last Fellini" deals with the director's difficulties in the 1980s and 1990s; A time when it became more and more difficult to find investors and support for his projects. The film also stars Roberto Benigni, Nicola Piovani, Vincenzo Mullica, Milo Manara and Fiammetta Profili, Fellini's loyal secretary.

Scorsese explains in the documentary that he was about to collaborate with Fellini in making a series of documentaries about different aspects of film production; A project that he himself calls a "crazy" collection. Each episode was supposed to be dedicated to one of the actors of the cinema, from the producer and actor to the cameraman and editor. Fellini even joked about the importance of the location manager, saying that his most important task was to find a place close to a good restaurant so the group could stop for lunch. Scorsese laughs when recounting this memory in the documentary.

The first one-hour episode of the series was supposed to be about the actor. Scorsese, who had a contract with Universal at that time, had managed to provide one million dollars to finance the project; But Fellini fell ill and died in October 1993. The documentary then reaches the final year of Fellini's life; when he traveled to Los Angeles to receive an honorary Oscar for lifetime achievement. Scorsese says their last phone call was made the day after the ceremony. He narrates in this documentary: "I picked up the phone and this time the voice was very weak. He just said, "Thank you, Martin. Thank you, thank you. You know, I'll see you soon." I said, "Yes, I hope so."

Scorsese says he's still not sure exactly what Fellini was thanking him for; Because the two had not directly discussed the funding of the project. However, Fellini's weak voice on that call has kept the memory alive for him.