The alternate ending for Italian director Federico Fellini’s “8 1/2,” believed lost for decades has turned up and will be put on exhibit.
Marcello Mastroianni starred in this autobiographical flick, which debuted 40 years ago on Feb. 14, about a harried film director who retreats into his memories to find peace.

The film, as it played in theaters, has the film director character Guido Anselmi deciding to go back to his wife while the characters of his past go by in a ring-around-the-rosy whirl. Considered one of Fellini’s greatest works, the Oscar-winning movie regularly ranks in polls that ask critics and directors to pick the 10 greatest films of all time.

The ending used was actually a shot as a trailer, but Fellini liked it so much he used it instead of the scene he had already shot where the women of Anselmi’s life are seated in the dining car of a train. The discarded footage was lost, but the Cinemarzaro Association found stills after buying the collection of journalist Gideon Bachmann who had followed the shooting of the film.

The association is planning an exhibit of 2,600 photos from the collection, many of which document the rapport between Mastroianni and Fellini, in July 2003 in Pordenone. A documentary about the lost ending is also in the works for the Cannes film festival.

Claudia Cardinale, who played a sort of dreamlike muse in the film, said she doesn’t remember much about the abandoned ending. "The film changed my life forever, Italian cinema was the best the world had," she told newspapers. "I only remember a bit about the train scene, mainly I have a sensation of love and two colors — the blinding white of the costumes and the black-grey of the smoke of the train."

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8 1/2
The DVD, includes an interview with Gideon Bachmann…

400 e average yearly cost of Italian checking account
+13% increase in banking fees, from 2001
+15.5% increase in debit/credit card use since introduction of euro
1 Sicilian town boycotting checking accounts

Italian consumers, irate with high banking costs, may just follow the example of one Sicilian town where cash-stuffed mattresses are more popular than ATMs.
A study by consumer group ADUSBEF recently revealed the trap of Italian checking accounts — average fees can rack up to 412 euro per year and since banks tack on hefty closing penalties consumers are reluctant to change banks. With the introduction of the euro, more Italians have relied on paying with debit cards, and in some cases fees for using ATMs has doubled.

Residents of Barrafranca, province of Enna, aren’t having any of it — about half of the town’s 14,000 residents don’t have a checking account. They get by with savings bankbooks for receiving paychecks and pensions and for everything else rely on cash.

"They freeze up if you even mention a checking account," one bank director told newspapers. "They think you’re out to get their money. You can try to explain all the advantages, but they turn a deaf ear." And maybe they’re not wrong…

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