A Late Masterpiece of Film Noir from The Master
of Film - Orson Welles
A Visually mindboggling Noirish thriller about corruption
and murder from
the Genius Orson Welles when he yet again had been offered full artistic
freedom and a decent budget (almost that is as he didn't have the right
to
cut the final version) and the result - beyond amazing.
This 110 minutes long version is NOT Welles original
version as this doesn't
exist anymore due to Universal cutting it into smithereens, and neither
is it the
massacred and re-cut Theatrical version that Universal released once
upon
a time when it was shown in theatres. This is the version Rick Schmidlin
put
together following the 58 page directive
with changes that a furious Orson
Welles demanded and sent to Universal after he, shocked, had seen the
slaughtered Universal version. So, this is the closest to Welles vision
of the
film we can get today (until the original film is found).
In this case Welles went to Mexico and the film company shredded his
film,
and 15 years earlier Welles went to Argentina or Brazil and the film
company
shredded his even greater Masterpiece - The Magnificent Ambersons.
A King Actor
Charlton Heston plays the role of Mexican cop Ramon
Vargas who's on his
way over the border into USA on a honeymoon with his wife Susan (the
oh
so lovely Janet Leigh) when he's drawn into a murder investigation led
by the
shabby and slimy corrupted to his bone crime-cop Hank Quinlan, played
by
Orson Welles in an unforgettable manner. Absolute genius King Acting
as
you stare at him mesmerized when he steal every scene his in, just filling
up
the screen, obliterating all other actors (except Marlene Dietrich)
daring to
share the screen-space with him.
Welles has changed the roles compared with the pretty good but obscure
crime novel by Whit Masterson, Hank is not the bad guy in the novel.
This
isn't mentioned in the Extras, but maybe they hadn't read the pulp story?
Unforgettable also is Marlene Dietrich in the role as
a Gypsy Bar and/or
Bordello owner. She's the one who, when the assistent of the District
attorney asks her what she did see in Hank Quinlan, ends the film with
her
famous line - "He Was Some Kind of
a Man" and then she walks away into
the night. So cool and Goosebumps for any Cineaste as the charisma around
Orson Welles and Marlene Dietrich (in her guest role) just sparkles.
Another thing that isn't mentioned in the Extras is the Homage in the
Elmore
Leonard novel based film Get Shorty where small-time gangster and filmlover
Chilli Palmer, played by John Travolta, almost with tears in his eyes
repeats t
his ending line from Touch of Evil to his girlfriend.
The Blu-ray presented the film in widescreen 1.85:1
with a DTS-HD MA 2.0
english audio, black & white, and with swedish and english subs.
Extras: A fine commentary audio track with Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh
and
with the producer of the restored version of the film, Rick Schmidlin,
and with
yet another audio commentary track with Rick Schmidlin where he deep-dives
into the re-construction of the film following Welles 58-page directive.
Two documentaries: 1. Bringing Evil to Life (21 minutes, 2008) with
Heston,
Leigh, Dennis Weaver and some fans of the film, as director Robert Wise
2. Evil Lost and Found (17 minutes, 2008) and a theatrical trailer
DVD edition was presented in anamorphic widescreen 1.85:1,
mono english
audio and black&white. Extras: Welles memo, trailer, production
notes, bios
