The film: "La Dolce Vita" (1960)
Federico Fellini (1920–1993) filmed La Dolce Vita in Rome between 1958 and 1959. The film was released on 5 February 1960 and is regarded as one of the absolute masterpieces of world cinema.
Plot and setting: Marcello Rubini (Marcello Mastroianni) is a society journalist living in the Rome of the late 1950s and early 1960s: Via Veneto, nights in clubs, international celebrities, scandals, media spectacles. The film is structured as a series of episodes without a linear plot, sketching a fresco of the Roman bourgeoisie in the era of the economic boom.
Award: Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, 1960.
The Trevi Fountain scene
The scene occurs in the third episode of the film. Marcello accompanies the Hollywood star Sylvia (played by Anita Ekberg, the Swedish actress) through a Roman night. Sylvia, captivating and heedless of convention, walks through the streets of Rome in her evening gown, finds a kitten, enters the Trevi Fountain and bathes in it.
Marcello follows her. The scene culminates in an iconic stillness: Sylvia, standing in the water, turns her face towards Marcello; he enters the basin; the water suddenly stops (it is dawn, the pumps switch off). The moment freezes.
Technical production details:
- Shot at night in December 1958 or January 1959 (sources vary)
- The water was heated to allow Anita Ekberg to stand in it for hours
- The shoot required multiple nights
- The piazza was closed to the public for filming
- The set was equipped with a forest of artificial lights
Anita Ekberg: "Marcello... come here"
The image of Anita Ekberg (1931–2015) in the fountain became one of the iconic photographs of the twentieth century. Swedish by birth, already Miss Sverige 1950, she had worked in Hollywood before this scene.
The line "Marcello... come here" is one of the most quoted moments in cinema history, though in the film the actual words are few: it is the image that communicates.
Anita Ekberg returned to the Trevi Fountain in 2009, for the film's 50th anniversary, and said she could no longer wade into the water — she was too old. The image of an elderly woman standing before the fountain where she had posed in her youth became an iconic image in its own right.
The historical context: Rome of the boom
The 1950s and 60s saw Rome transform itself. After the poverty of the postwar years, the Italian economic miracle (1958–1963) brought rapid prosperity, consumerism, television and the automobile. Via Veneto was the epicentre of international high life: Fellini himself frequented those cafés.
Fellini's film is a veiled critique of this transformation: the dolce vita is seductive but empty. The Trevi Fountain in Sylvia's scene represents ancient beauty profaned by modernity — or perhaps, liberated by it.
The cultural impact
Before La Dolce Vita, the Trevi Fountain was already famous, but it was one Baroque monument among many in Rome. The film transformed it into a universal symbol.
Paparazzi: the word itself comes from the film. Paparazzo is the name of a photographer character in the film (played by Walter Santesso); the term entered languages around the world.
Effect on tourism: after 1960, visitor numbers at the fountain increased dramatically. Fellini's scene created an imagery that drives millions of tourists to (ideally) imitate Sylvia's gesture.
The coin tradition: though the legend predates the film, the American film Three Coins in the Fountain (1954) had already contributed to spreading it. But it is La Dolce Vita that gave the Trevi Fountain its modern mythic dimension.
Fellini and Rome
Fellini was born in the Romagna region (Rimini, 1920) but lived in Rome from the late 1930s. Rome is the thread running through all his work: Roma (1972), Amarcord (1973, set in Rimini but with the Roman spirit), 8½ (1963). His Rome is always nocturnal, Baroque, carnal, dreamlike.
The Trevi Fountain is not merely a location for Fellini: it is the Rome of dreams, the water flowing in the heart of the city, the immortal beauty that survives modernity.
The visual legacy
The Ekberg-Mastroianni scene has been reinterpreted, parodied and paid homage to countless times in popular culture:
- Advertising (fashion, perfume, cars)
- Music videos
- Films and TV series citing the scene
- Tourists' photographs attempting to replicate it
Every year, thousands of people have their photograph taken in front of the fountain in an attempt to evoke that scene — even without having seen the film directly.
A double monument
The Trevi Fountain today exists on two superimposed levels:
- The historical monument: a late Roman Baroque masterpiece, completed in 1762 to Nicola Salvi's design
- The pop icon: the site of the Ekberg scene, the symbol of the dolce vita, the wishing fountain
The two levels are inseparable. Every tourist who arrives sees both, often without distinguishing them.
Visit the Trevi Fountain with a private driver
The fountain is in a ZTL zone.
Visit the Trevi Fountain with a private driver: arrive like a character from La Dolce Vita, without Rome's traffic. Service from €49. → Book your driver at myromedriver.com
Frequently asked questions
When was the Anita Ekberg scene at the Trevi Fountain filmed? On nights in December 1958 or January 1959 (sources vary slightly).
Is the fountain scene in Fellini's "La Dolce Vita"? Yes. The scene is in the third episode of the film, with Anita Ekberg (Sylvia) and Marcello Mastroianni (Marcello).
Was the water heated for filming? Yes. The basin water was heated to allow Anita Ekberg to stand in it for the many hours of night shooting.
Article no. 91 — TIER S — MON-05 Trevi Fountain Type: HISTORICAL Words: ~1,200