The scenes in and around the television studio, as the two forlorn old troupers come to terms with the punkish fauna of the 1980s, are -- for this director -- strangely verveless and unfocused.

When, as happens on several occasions, Amelia and Pippo become an integral part of the impressionistic film that surrounds them, instead of just being witnesses to it, Ginger and Fred ranks with the best work Mr. Fellini has ever done.

The film isn't a particularly pleasurable experience (the satire of television is broad and wayward, and the attempts to wring pathos from Ginger and Fred's geriatric infirmities fall far short of the mark), but it does have a cranky, old-man's integrity.

Fellini’s target is clearly the vacuousness of TV (there is even. a humiliating game show), yet while he mocks its banality and slickness, his mode of entertaining seems virtually the same; he only magnifies its idiocy. This isn’t really fair.