Authenticity in the Films of Federico Fellini

Abstract

Sartre and Beauvoir refuted the criticism of existentialism as a bleak, pessimistic world view. While I agree with them, one might well think there is something to that criticism given the emphasis on meaninglessness which pervades the previous three chapters. But the force of existentialist philosophy lies in showing us where we can go wrong as a means of getting it all right. In order to make a meaningful life, one that we actively engage from our own concrete perspective, it is necessary to understand the pitfalls in contemporary culture. The seductions and diversions of the modern world and its emphasis on money, privilege and status, the temptation to exploit the contingencies of morality and rationalize your behavior after the fact, the difficulty of finding spiritual depth in a world in which traditional religious perspectives have been compromised — these conditions constitute the terrain in which we must find our way. The authentic person does not deny these conditions and finds meaning despite them (and perhaps, in part, because of them). The remainder of this book will emphasize the existentialists’ attempts to find a solution to the challenges we’ve been describing in previous chapters.