Italian writer-director Nanni Moretti (Caro diario) stars in this Felliniesque romp (1981) about a self-doubting filmmaker concocting a movie about a lunatic who thinks he’s Sigmund Freud. What follows is a maddening melange of scenes from the filmmaker’s real life and dream states, exploring the idea of the artist as a victim of analysis and critique. Though some of Moretti’s visual references are derived from European art cinema, his maniacal humor (Freud as a street peddler, a Maoist chorus, a TV game show with filmmakers as contestants) owes more of a debt to Mel Brooks. 105 min.
