Saw I Vitelloni (1953), a Fellini film about four slackers who bumble through small-town life, initially optimistic about their futures, but increasingly settling down into lives of frustrated mediocrity. The slacker that film mainly follows is this philandering dude who is forced into a shotgun wedding but who drifts from job to job, woman to woman, surrogate parent to surrogate parent. The film is intentionally fairly depressing with moments of levity to keep it from being too miserable. It skewers the idea of middle-class comforts which, for the 50s, may have been fairly edgy.
For me, it was a bit of a slog. I severely judged the main character dude for upsetting his long-suffering wife again and again. I wasn't amused by his sleazy shenanigans and that just leaves the growing we're-stuck-here feeling that bogs down all of the other characters as well.
There's a touch of The Graduate in some of the scenes, as the main characters are assigned roles and then condemned for not flourishing in them. Similar to the The Graduate too the main characters are directionless and vaguely uncomfortable. This film predates The Graduate however and is black and white and Italian and, as I say, a bit of a slog. It's sort of hopeful but also sort of bleak.
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