SOPHIE’S CHOICE had been mentioned in overheard conversations at the 2nd Annual TCM Classic Film Festival more than any other film. It didn’t screen, but rather was used to convey a sense of the impossible choices attendees were asked to make as the packed schedule consistently clashed at least four “must-see” classics in similar time slots. Where else could you hear people contemplating between seeing Angela Lansbury introducing GASLIGHT or Richard Roundtree introducing SHAFT? Do you choose Kirk Douglas over Roger Corman? Is that even fair to ask? These four pack-full days of screenings provided enough cinephilic dilemmas to last at least until next year.

Day one (Thursday) of the festival kicked off with a gala screening of AN AMERICAN IN PARIS at Grauman’s Chinese, quite possibly the most iconic film theater in the U.S. And how nice it was to see figures such as Leslie Caron, Peter O’Toole, Eva Marie Saint, Mickey Rooney, Jane Powell, and so many others walk the same red carpet they must once have been so familiar with.

My own journey didn’t start in PARIS but in a small seaside village. Somehow, despite my adoration of Gene Tierney, I managed to never before see THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR, which screened as part of the festival’s tribute to composer Bernard Herrmann (and introduced by his daughter). FIR’s Editor, Roy Frumkes, warned me about the emotional charge of this unlikely story about a young widow who falls in love with the ghost of a sea captain (Rex Harrison). Sure enough, it could squeeze tears out of a rock. Tierney’s features, without a doubt, were carved by the gods to flicker at 24-frames per second.

Joseph von Sternberg’s THE DEVIL IS A WOMAN screened next, starring Marlene Dietrich as a seemingly unredeemable woman who causes a rift between two friends, a Spanish officer (Lionel Atwill) and an outlaw rebel (Cesar Romero). A story reminiscent of Clarence Brown’s 1925 Garbo-starrer, FLESH AND THE DEVIL, and of one of its most memorable lines: “When the Devil can’t reach us through the spirit, he creates a woman beautiful enough to reach us through the flesh.”

The Spanish government found THE DEVIL IS A WOMAN highly offensive and demanded Paramount take it out of circulation. The studio, in return, destroyed the original negative. Luckily for film viewers, it was Dietrich’s favorite film of herself and she kept a print in her safe, which is the source of the copies available today. The jaw-dropping new restoration by the MOMA accentuated the richness and unrestrained sensuality of this masterpiece.

Friday (Day two) started with THE CONSTANT NYMPH, a 1943 Edmund Goulding film starring Joan Fontaine and Charles Boyer. TCM’s host, Robert Osborne, introduced the special screening, noting that due to copyright issues it hasn’t been properly seen since its original release. Osborne was particularly excited about THE CONSTANT NYMPH since TCM has been trying to clear the rights to show it for the past 18 years. It was worth the wait. Fontaine received an Oscar nomination for her role as Tessa, an unhealthy fourteen year-old country girl, hopelessly in love with the much older composer, Lewis Dodd (Boyer). Goulding perfectly balances the melodrama with light-hearted touches. Fontaine’s performance may be one of her best. TCM has yet to announce their premiere date for THE CONSTANT NYMPH, but when they do, set your DVR’s.

Barbara Rush was in attendance to introduce Nick Ray’s 1956 Technicolor melodrama, BIGGER THAN LIFE, the REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE of prescription drug abuse films. James Mason stars as a man diagnosed with a rare condition that leaves him with months to live. His only hope is an experimental cortisone treatment that saves his life but also makes him psychotic. Rush co-stars as his wife. BIGGER THAN LIFE is out on Blu-Ray by Criterion, and while their transfer is supreme (and highly recommended), nothing compares to the real thing. Few directors besides Ray and Douglas Sirk were able to extract such darkness out of the saturation and brightness of the Technicolor process, although Ray’s composition and use of color seems less sentimental and more sinister. Mason, who also produced the film, storms through it with terrifying conviction. Not surprisingly, this intense drama did not find much success upon its initial release, but nevertheless, it is a well-deserved rediscovered classic.

I had to cut Friday short due to a personal engagement. That meant coming to terms with missing, among others, Roger Corman in attendance for LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, Kirk Douglas at SPARTACUS, Mickey Rooney at GIRL CRAZY, a restoration of William Wyler’s great film (and one of Walter Huston’s best performances), DODSWORTH, and one of my most anticipated events, Kevin Brownlow (possibly the greatest living film historian) introducing Erich von Stroheim’s THE MERRY WIDOW.

Saturday (Day 3) found me standing in a line stretching around the block for a 9am screening of Carol Reed’s THE THIRD MAN at The Egyptian, Sid Grauman’s first Hollywood theater (1922). Angela Allen, the script supervisor who worked on the film, stayed for a post-screening discussion. And while the sun never rises too early for a touch of Orson Welles, my heart wasn’t with one of the greatest Noirs ever made. I anxiously awaited the following event, a 50th anniversary screening of THE PARENT TRAP, with Hayley Mills in attendance.

If one film bears responsibility for my falling in love with cinema, it is THE PARENT TRAP. Despite watching it countless times since it originally captured me on VHS as a kid, every repeat viewing carries the emotional impact of the first time. TCM programmed it as the centerpiece of a tribute to Hayley Mills that also included SUMMER MAGIC and WHISTLE DOWN THE WIND. In 1960, Mills received the final (out of 11) Juvenile Awards ever given by the Academy, for POLLYANNA, her first American role. How fitting that her win book-ended an award that originated for Shirley Temple in 1934.

A video tribute to Mills played before the screening, followed by a conversation moderated by Leonard Maltin. She still possesses the same charismatic youthful charm that made her a star to begin with. Mills entranced the audience in person as much as immediately after when the beautifully saturated print projected on the screen. THE PARENT TRAP holds up as the quintessential Disney film. On a personal level, it may have been the most meaningful experience I had in a cinema.

From The Egyptian I headed to The Chinese to see the new digital restoration of CITIZEN KANE. A second dose of Welles. The screening followed a lively conversation between TCM’s Ben Mankiewicz (grandson of KANE’s screenwriter, Herman J. Mankiewicz) and Norman Lloyd, a member of Welles’s original Mercury Players. The digital print, which some may find satisfying, seemed offensively sharp to me. In fact, the fake opening documentary sequence almost looked like HD footage masked by digital effects, to make it “look like film”. These films were never meant to look so sharp, and having the power to tweak them doesn’t mean we should abuse it. But, that said, CITIZEN KANE sucks you in. Sharp or soft, it would be a cinematic tour de force even as a slideshow.

Bruce Goldstein of the Film Forum in New York produced several special events for the festival. The first, a day earlier, a screening of William Castle’s THE TINGLER, theatrics included, that ran at the Forum a few months back. On Saturday he organized a screening of Buster Keaton’s THE CAMERAMAN at The Egyptian, with live musical accompaniment by Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks. Giordano’s orchestra channeled the period’s musical style in an educated, authentic, and enticing fashion. In that old-Hollywood theater, the year was 1928 again. And like wine from a particularly good year, when it comes to film, it rarely gets better than ’28.

In need of more light-hearted fare after almost 12-hours in film theaters, I opted for SHAFT over GASLIGHT. A screening that punctuates the incredible diversity of films TCM chose to feature. Film historian Donald Bogle, and Shaft himself, Richard Roundtree, introduced the action classic.

The 10am screening of NIGHT FLIGHT (1933) on Day 4 (Sunday) had been completely packed by 9:20, with only a few lone seats to be snagged by scavengers. Introducing the film, Robert Osborne mentioned it to be the screening he was most excited about alongside THE CONSTANT NYMPH. Another rarely seen picture, it has been out of circulation since 1942. Produced by Darryl Zanuck and directed by Clarence Brown, it featured an all-star cast including John and Lionel Barrymore, Helen Hayes, Clark Gable, Myrna Loy and Robert Montgomery. According to Osborne NIGHT FLIGHT had been planned to be an ensemble film in the vein of GRAND HOTEL, following the story of airmail pilots on a dangerous night flight mission. Seems odd that with so many power players NIGHT FLIGHT remains obscure, but beyond its historical significance and competent cinematography it remains a lackluster affair. A paper-thin storyline and uninspired performances prevent it from truly engaging the viewer. A post-screening conversation took place between Osborne and Drew Barrymore, in which she enthusiastically spoke about her legendary family tree and their works.

Next up, WHISTLE DOWN THE WIND. More Hayley Mills. A 1961 British production directed by Bryan Forbes and produced by Richard Attenborough. Based on a novel by Mills’s mother, Mary Hayley Bell, the story revolves around three children who discover an escaped murderer (Alan Bates) in their family barn and mistake him for Jesus Christ. Mills’s maturity as an actress, even at a young age, could be seen by her unconventional choice of roles. Making a film like WHISTLE DOWN THE WIND, a wonderfully contemplative, melancholic coming-of-age tale, in the same year as THE PARENT TRAP. Or in 1966, starring in both THE TROUBLE WITH ANGELS as somewhat of a continuation of her Disney characters, and THE FAMILY WAY in England, which explored womanhood and sex. Mills stayed for a lengthy Q&A post-screening. She mentioned that her father, John Mills, originally wanted to direct WHISTLE DOWN THE WIND, but dropped out. Interesting, considering he directed the very similar SKY WEST AND CROOKED in 1966, also starring Mills and written by her mother.

Given that the festival paid tribute to both Mills and Bernard Herrmann, I wished for a screening of TWISTED NERVE, a terrific horror film with her in the lead and the Hermann score made famous by Tarantino’s KILL BILL.

Later on Sunday, Bruce Goldstein hosted a tribute to the Nicholas Brothers, an African-American dance duo who were greatly admired by the likes of Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Michael Jackson, and countless others. Goldstein narrated a selection of clips from films that featured Harold and Fayard Nicholas, such as DOWN ARGENTINE WAY and THE PIRATE, alongside TV appearances, rare film footage shot by the brothers, and interview clips from a 1992 documentary he made about them. Their dance routines were so exhilarating that the audience burst into applause after every single clip, as if we were privy to a live performance. Robert Townsend, director of HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE, was in attendance, as well as the brothers’ families, which made the presentation all the more touching. Goldstein finished by playing an encore of the “staircase” routine from STORMY WEATHER, a piece Astaire called the greatest musical sequence ever.

The Nicholas Brothers in Action

Sunday ended with a newly restored print of Mike Nichols’ WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?, with cinematographer Haskell Wexler in attendance. Wexler confided prior to the screening that he originally refused to shoot VIRGINIA WOOLF due to a previous commitment. Jack Warner finally convinced him, assuring him that if he didn’t shoot the film he would never work in Hollywood again. A good choice considering it won him his first Academy Award. VIRGINIA WOOLF, for all its great performances, is elevated from a theater play to cinematic beauty thanks primarily to Wexler’s cinematography. He consistently finds movement in static situations, extracting it directly from the emotional state of the characters. The print restoration, which he supervised, looked magnificent.

When the Academy quietly pulled the lifetime achievement awards from its televised award ceremony, it seemed like the American film industry had finally rid its conscience of its history. Even film festivals in the U.S. rarely juxtapose the current state of cinema with its heritage. A successful future cannot exist without a consideration of the past. The unique way in which the TCM Classic Film Festival celebrates these classics as if they were the hottest films of the moment balances this “out with the old” approach, making it, at least spiritually, the most important film festival in the United States.

“So, did you really want to whip America into a Martian Invasion frenzy?” “What do you really have against poor William Randolph Hearst?” These are questions one might want to ask if they spent an evening with the late great Orson Welles.

Stage Direct, a Seattle based theatre company tries to make this possible with their video presentation THE MAGNIFICENT WELLES. Their 93-minute video is simply a taping of a one man performance by writer/producer Marcus Wolland. Wolland portrays 27 year old Orson Welles in 1942, waiting out the storm of two (at the time incomplete) important film projects in a Brazilian hotel. The film projects of course, are THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS (Welles’ second film for RKO, and in this writer’s mind, one of the most important, beautifully made films of wartime Hollywood) and IT’S ALL TRUE, his filmic contribution to the war effort. Wolland, who looks like a somewhat heavier version of 1940′s Welles, does a rather impressive job. He captures the mannerisms found in young Orson Welles, the same facial expressions Welles used in portraying Charles Foster Kane are imitated here. Welles is a tough character to play. He was charming, arrogant, ingenius and stubbornly idiotic all at the same time. That’s a handful for any actor. Here we see Welles engage in a telephone argument with RKO exec George Schaffer, dictate editing instructions to AMBERSONS’ editor, Robert Wise. He also reflects on his upbringing, and his explosive work on the stage and radio before highlighting Hollywood history. Fans of Orson Welles (I happen to be one) won’t get much new information out of this video. They already learned all the information contained here from documentaries and books on Welles and CITIZEN KANE. Film students just learning about KANE, TOUCH OF EVIL, and Welles’ contribution to the growth of film could find this a fun learning experience.

There’s something else interesting about this release. As I stated before, it is a videotape of a performance that was held before a live audience (you can occasionally hear the audience laugh at Wolland’s jokes) A trailer at the beginning of MAGNIFICENT WELLES reveals that Stage Direct, the theatre company, is marketing video recordings of their other stage presentations, as well. It allows usually struggling regional theatre companies to market their plays even further. Let’s see if this works.

THE AMERICANIZATION OF CHRISTOPHER LEE

“You’re writing an autobiography? Who is it about?”

That priceless remark was spoken to actor Christopher Lee by a PR woman from United Artists as he toured America promoting THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN. Christopher played the title character in that installment of the Roger Moore/James Bond films.

In May of 1958 I was sitting in the balcony of one of those splendid old movie palaces from the “roaring twenties” that still existed in downtown Los Angeles at that time. I was the ripe old age of 11, with my mother in tow (she was compelled to accompany me as the theater would not allow anyone under 12 inside), preparing to see what was to be a life-altering experience as we watched for the first time THE HORROR OF DRACULA with Peter Cushing as Prof.Van Helsing and Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, in blood curdling Technicolor.

Up until that moment my viewing experience with Horror films were mainly the black and white movies I watched on television thanks to Shock Theater. (The glorious exception being the 3-D shocker HOUSE OF WAX in 1953.) I was already hooked on Boris Karloff and especially Bela Lugosi, in fact Lugosi had just died a couple of years before and left my childhood a little darker because of it. I was so enamored of Lugosi’s performance as the Count that his death was reported to me – then a rather intense seven year old – by my pal, the local theater manger (who had taken me under his wing) as I left a matinee performance of some current “giant bug flick” in 1956. He stopped me with the words “your friend the horror actor just died.” This was the first time I think I realized It would not be possible to meet all the actors I admired on the silver screen, so on that very day I vowed to never let any opportunity escape me to encounter my idols face-to-face and express what a difference their work made in allowing my imagination to soar and marvel at the sorcery that was the movie-going experience, especially in the young and obsessed.

Strange that I can still remember that afternoon in Los Angeles over forty years ago watching Christopher Lee, in less than ten minutes of actual screen time, reinvent the role of Count Dracula for an entirely new generation of Horror fans. At that age I had a coward’s habit of hiding behind the back of the theater seat in front of me just as something truly frightening was about to occur onscreen. When Dracula’s bride bares her fangs to feast on the mild mannered librarian’s neck, the poor soul(John Van Eyssen) had just arrived at Castle Dracula to sort out the Count’s books when suddenly the library door bursts forth and in strides Christopher Lee, his face gorged on human blood, his eyes filled with red contact lenses. Hissing like an animal, Dracula leaps across the library table, hurls the female vampire like a rag doll to the floor …it was a defining moment that liberated the Horror film as we knew it across the world.

I found myself both shocked and mesmerized by what I had just seen, I remained transfixed and somewhat frozen in my seat until the house lights finally went up and my mother took me, shaken and a bit stirred, from the theater, convinced her friends were right and horror films were indeed a bad influence on the minds of children. To her everlasting credit she never prevented me from seeing one during my whole misspent childhood. In my case it was far too late to save my soul from the damnation of Hammer films.

I kept faithful to that promise sworn in 1956. As the summer of 1971 unfolded, I found myself in London as Christopher Lee was about to give one of the then popular “John Player” lectures at the National Film Theater. At that time Christopher was still making films for Hammer and would wear those red contact lenses at least another year before moving on to more mainstream fare in international films. The theater was filled to capacity that afternoon so as soon as the film clips were at an end, Christopher Lee finished up his Q&A by informing his audience that “At the moment I have fourteen films on offer.” As he left the stage I made a beeline for the lobby and of course I walked right into him, surrounded by the faithful, signing autographs, and was soon engaging him in conversation. To my amazement he seemed aware that this was a preordained moment, so I was able to have my say, informing him once again what he must have heard dozens of times from fans my age – how his performance as Dracula was a defining moment in our childhoods…etc.. Lee thoughtfully listened to what I had to say and was very kind and generous with his time. Somehow I felt we would meet again.

Six years later the fates would decree that I would actually be working in the business and living in Beverly Hills no less, enjoying the good life as a talent agent representing the DEL VALLE, FRANKLIN AND LEVINE AGENCY in Century City. One evening I took some friends to see actress-turned-chanteuse Sally Kellerman trying out her “nightclub act” in West Hollywood at Studio One’s infamous Backlot cabaret. We arrived late and found ourselves seated at a table with what turned out to be a most colorful, somewhat closeted character named Terry James. It seems this gentleman was at one time the “Lord Mayor of London” very well connected to the British film colony in Hollywood and a real hoot in his own right. Terry acted the part and it was not unusual to see him dressed like a character right out of A PASSAGE TO INDIA, complete with pit helmet, walking about West Hollywood “inspecting the colonies” as Terry was fond of saying, hoping to put us “Yanks” in our place.

During one of our many lunches around town Terry was quick to discover that I was not only a devoted Anglophile, but that we shared a passion for film history as well. One afternoon he mentioned that he had dinner the night before with Christopher Lee and how difficult it was for him to adjust to life in Hollywood and so on. I seized the moment at once and told Terry about my encounter with him at the National all those years ago. Once Terry realized how much Christopher Lee’s films had meant to me growing up, he started to laugh, explaining how this information would amuse and inflate a certain British actor’s already enormous ego. Terry then and there decided it was time that Christopher Lee and I were properly introduced. Terry did make it clear that if it was my intention to make the transition from fan to Hollywood professional I should never bring up the “Count” or Hammer films unless the occasion warranted such a discussion. Terry then issued a warning about Christopher’s notorious way with money and that under no circumstances was I to pay for his meals beyond the ones I invited him to share with me. It seems that over the course of their friendship in Hollywood, Christopher had begun a habit of letting Terry pick up the check until one afternoon Terry let him have it by saying “if you think it is some sort of honor to be seen dining in your company then bloody well think again mate!” Frankly it was kind of an urban legend around town regarding the British and how tight they all were with a dollar, so this did not deter me. If I had to be imposed upon, who better then “Count Dracula” himself to drain my pocketbook.

Criterion Collection
Disc One: the Corinth version 1955. 99 minutes. Black & White. Mono Aspect ratio 1:33:1
Disc Two: CONFIDENTIAL REPORT. 1955. 98 minutes. Black & White. Mono. Aspect ratio 1:33:1
Disc Three: The Comprehensive Version. 2006. 105 minutes. Black & White. Mono. Aspect ratio 1:33:1

When I was young, I used to stay up late. There was something appealing about the sudden stillness that pervaded Manhattan streets around three AM. Then, the simple backfiring of a gypsy cab seemed important. I would watch television silently so my parents wouldn’t hear. Sandwiched between utterly weird commercials – I remember in particular one with fat men in baby clothes promoting cribs – were equally strange films. Once, distracted by the rustling of leaves against the windowpane, I turned to see this mysterious image that seemed not only out of place, but out of time.
It was, of course, in glorious black and white; but perhaps shades of gray would be more accurate. In the courtyard of a bombed-out building in Munich, a trench-coated man is surrounded by drifting snowflakes. It is Christmas Eve, for a brass band plays carols outside. Checking a scrap of paper in his pocket, he passes through an arched Gothic doorway as the camera tracks backwards. Soon he is only a tiny dot in the center of the screen. The camera lingers on this image, then slowly fades, reminding one of an eye staring into nothingness, or perhaps inhabiting the view of an unknown watcher. This image is from Orson Welles’ MR. ARKADIN, and has stayed in my memory ever since.
Unfortunately, this vision remains more of a possibly, or perhaps an hallucination, for as with many Welles projects, the film is unfinished. Louis Dolivet, the producer – who according to one of the Criterion set’s extras, was a KGB agent who murdered at least three people – barred Welles from the cutting room. Dolivet then radically altered the film, which was released in Europe in 1955 as CONFIDENTIAL REPORT. (That version is on the second disc of the Criterion set.)
Although there are striking scenes, including a masked ball that invokes Goya with careening low-angles and grotesque faces, MR. ARKADIN for me has always been a deeply flawed and fairly unwatchable piece of work. This despite the editorial staff of “Cahiers du Cinema” in 1956 , including Godard & Truffaut, voting it the best film ever made. So when I heard Criterion was coming out with a complete version, I was curious to see if my attitude would change.
“Complete” is a bit of a misnomer, as there are four variants with different editing , dialogue and even scenes. Jorge Luis Borges, that Argentine purveyor of mazes, once wrote that Orson Welles’ films were labyrinths without a center. What we are left with is a series of dazzling fragments, mirrored by the unfinished state of the film itself. Working one’s way through these discs is akin to becoming an investigator in a seemingly unsolvable mystery.
There is a center, however, and that is the new comprehensive edition prepared by Stefan Drossler & Claude Bertemes of the Luxembourg Cinematheque. They have assembled the existing versions into a form that is easy to watch as well as valid to Welles’ original vision. A work that has heretofore been known in muddy 16mm prints, it is a bit of a shock to see the polished and perfect visuals on display here. Suddenly, MR. ARKADIN is no longer an empty exercise betraying the vagaries of low budget and bad continuity. For the first time, I found myself caring about these characters, on the edge of my seat, even. Looking at what has been accomplished here, one feels that if Welles’ had been allowed to complete the project, it might have even been the popular success he craved.
As in CITIZEN KANE, MR. ARKADIN is a mystery; the mystery of a man. In this case, Guy van Stratten (Robert Arden), expatiate American con man, is hired by Gregory Arkadin (Orson Welles), a mysterious Balkan billionaire arms dealer, to discover his forgotten past. Arkadin (who seems enamored of false beards, not to mention a fugitive accent) professes amnesia, remembering only as far back as 1927, when he appeared in Warsaw with $20,000 in his pocket. A further complication is Guy’s romantic involvement with Arkadin’s daughter Raina (Paola Mori).
Arkadin’s anger towards this liaison is almost incestuous, underscored by the intimacy Mori displays towards Welles onscreen. (Welles and Mori were engaged when this film was being made.) As Guy continues his investigation, every person he meets who knew Arkadin–including Misha Auer as a flea circus owner who beds his troupe on himself (“Feeding time!”, he calls out), and an amazing Michael Redgrave as a Polish eccentric in a hairnet–ends up dead. It soon becomes clear that Guy is the only living person who still knows Arkadin’s secret.
Welles’ doomed opus could also be considered the granddaddy of all indie art movies. It is easy to list films, not to mention directors, that have sprung, Athena-like, from MR. ARKADIN’s baroque enigmas: ALPHAVILLE, THX1138, THE CONVERSATION, TAXI DRIVER, THE PASSENGER. Imagine the complicated flashback structure of CITIZEN KANE crossed with a 50′s paperback novel of international intrigue and looking like one of Cocteau’s poetic meditations.
The Criterion edition comes in this fat, reddish-brown box with serious design aspirations. On the cover, Orson Welles’ face, partially obscured by a fake beard and putty nose, is surrounded by pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Inside, one finds a novel attributed to Welles but actually written by Maurice Bessy, a friend of Welles during his European sojourn. Still, it is worth looking at, for Guy Van Stratten is given huge swatches of Welles’ childhood, preparing one for the autobiographical elements that are less explicitly stated in the film, but evoked through composition and editing, the same way Mozart articulates Beaumarchais’ revolutionary politics through music in “The Marriage Of Figaro”.
As for the film, it is spread over three discs. The first disc contains the “Corinth edition”. An early edit retaining the original flashback structure conceived by Welles on the eve of shooting, it was discovered in 16mm by Peter Bogdanovich in 1963 and premiered at the New Yorker theatre. Unfortunately, this version has poor image quality and is also plagued by particularly confusing continuity.
A big plus on this disc, though, is a wonderful commentary by Jonathan Rosenbaum and James Naremore. In particular, they focus on Welles’ filming method as the equivalent of sniper activity. Due to the lack of even a moderate budget, MR. ARKADIN was made entirely in Welles’ head–on the run, so to speak–with shots taken out of continuity and even done in different locations. In order to achieve a finished film under what must have been pure chaos, Welles invented a style that has since become the lingua franca of international art cinema; in particular the post-modern excursions of Antonioni and Godard.
However, in Welles’ hands, the intention is not to alienate. The style appeared out of necessity. Shots are strung together in an almost cubist manner, while maintaining continuity through dialogue and camera placement. For instance, a shot in Spain of Paola Mori near a Medieval castle is cut together with another filmed in Munich with a different background (and lighting scheme). One is constantly being pushed out of the film, only to be pulled back again.
For all its surface avant-garde trappings, though, the montage is directly connected, in an almost classical manner, with the deeper meaning of the film. These rhythmic mosaics of disparate images, accompanied by an equally rhythmic soundtrack, somehow create the same effect of intense involvement in a viewer as the long take, deep focus shots in CITIZEN KANE. (This is not entirely strange, as there is a great deal of subtle counterpoint between different elements of the shots in KANE; for instance, the famous scene where Kane’s parents are discussing his future while he is seen through the window sledding in the snow outside.)
With this in mind, it is particularly fascinating watching the footage of Welles directing on the third and final disc. We see him feeding lines to actors on camera and even prompting them as to rhythm and tone. Obviously, he had intentions on using only specific pieces of what he was shooting. He also changes dialogue from take to take, for instance, in the hotel room scene, where “New York” later becomes “Paris”.
It is this scene of confrontation between Guy, Arkadin and Raina that for me is the film’s pivotal moment. Here the plot driven mechanics of espionage suddenly spirals into personal tragedy. The film’s look also becomes darker, not to mention claustrophobic. Arkadin and Raina appear simultaneously at Guy’s hotel with opposite aims in mind. The camera follows them down a dim corridor into a tiny room beset by strobing neon against Venetian blinds, the curtain-like backdrop simultaneously theatrical & other-worldly. (If this makes one think of ALPHAVILLE or ERASERHEAD, it is not, I believe, accidental.)
In these low-angle close ups of a brooding Welles inundated by flashing lights, the feeling of jealousy is almost palpable, putting one in mind of OTHELLO (which, of course, was Welles’ previous film.) Suddenly, the pulpy plot and science-fiction like visuals combine to create not just a different style, but a form that forces us to look beyond the surface of things, past tacky make-up and low budget lighting, to the human beast in the center whose emotions are in themselves a kind of labyrinth. Perhaps the unknown watcher in the opening shots of MR. ARKADIN isn’t such a mystery after all.

Extra Features: Audio commentary by Jonathan Rosenbaum & James Naremore, interview with Simon Callow featuring his audio interview with star Robert Arden, three episodes of the radio program “The Lives of Harry Lime” & an interview with producer Harry Allan Towers, a new documentary featuring interviews with film historians Stefan Drossler, Claude Bertemes & Peter Bogdanovich, outtakes, rushes & alternate scenes from the film, stills gallery, “Mr. Arkadin” the novel with a preface by Robert Polito & a booklet featuring J. Hoberman, Francois Thomas, Rosenbaum, Drossler & a time-line of “Arkadin” related events.

Credits:
Original story, screenplay & direction by Orson Welles.
Photography by Jean Bourgoin.
Edited by Renzo Lucidi.
Music by Paul Misraki.
Produced by Louis Dolivet.

Cast: Orson Welles, Robert Arden, Paola Mori, Patricia Medina, Akim Tamiroff, Gregoire Aslan, Jack Watling, Mischa Auer, Peter van Eyck, Michael Redgrave, Suzanne Flon, Frederic O’Brady, Katina Paxinou.

By Sam Staggs
Revised 4/04/00 / Illustrated. 369 pp.
New York: St. Martin’s Press / $24.95

Half a century after its 1950 release, All About Eve endures as “one of the most enjoyable movies ever made,” in Pauline Kael’s estimation. In part, this is because the film features a truly bravura performance by its star, Bette Davis, as a theatrical diva whose temper tantrums towards others are as much fun to watch as are her savage misgivings about herself.

But it is the remarkably literate and witty screenplay by Joseph L. Mankiewicz which makes All About Eve a rarity among American film classics. Mankiewicz’s text is studded with bon mots a la Oscar Wilde, in addition to allusions to a host of historic theater figures. A backstage comedy of ill manners, played by a sterling cast, the film concerns the rise of a scheming actress (Anne Baxter)–the eponymous Eve–who plots to supplant a reigning Broadway star (Davis) by betraying every member of the star’s coterie after they have befriended her. All About Eve is really all about succeeding as well as succession.

Sam Staggs’ “All About ‘All About Eve’” is not nearly as comprehensive a work as its title suggests. It leaves out Mankiewicz’s own, elegant, 1972 essay on the film’s creation combined with his brilliant screenplay, titled “More About ‘All About Eve.’” Mr. Staggs denigrates Mankiewicz’s book as “turgid and meandering” while praising his own work by writing, “I had unified the contradictory narratives and random gossip into an authentic account of All About Eve and all those connected with it.”

Mr. Staggs commits such turgid sentences as, “The subtext has beguiled several generations of devotees, largely gay men, who have ‘read’ the film as though it beamed a limelight into the closet of their hearts.”

Despite his current book’s many charts and sidebars (every esoteric theater figure receives at least an introductory paragraph), this volume is composed almost entirely of stale gossip and marginal trivia in lieu of any significant analysis. (Mr. Staggs’ only previous publication is the obscure novel, “MM II: The Return of Marilyn Monroe.”)

Much space is given to such peripheral subjects as Mary Orr, the author of the 1946 Cosmopolitan short story, “The Wisdom of Eve,” on which All About Eve was based. Staggs also profiles Martina Lawrence, the real-life prototype of Orr’s Eve, who was befriended and then rejected by the actress Elisabeth Bergner. Though Staggs appreciates that Orr’s fiction is “a second-rate story in a forgotten magazine [sic]” and merely “the embryo” for Mankiewicz’s magisterial script, he gives Orr a parity with Mankiewicz which she does not deserve.

In this hodge-podge of a book, Staggs analyzes the coffee and ink stains as well as the lipstick blots in the archival copy of Bette Davis’s script at Boston University so portentously, that you can never take him seriously again.

Staggs discovers a “sacra conversazione ” in one of the film’s best-known production stills of Anne Baxter, Bette Davis, Marilyn Monroe and George Sanders at the “Fasten-your-seat-belts” party scene. But since the photo lacks a Virgin and Child, Staggs quickly changes his pretentious designation to one of “three types of female beauty.”

In Staggs’ most useful discovery, he cites seven lines from All About Eve which made their way into Edward Albee’s equally bitch-witted play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, (1962).

The only notable but well-worn story of the uneventful production–the scripted romance between Bette Davis and Gary Merrill becoming real–is expanded by Staggs to inordinate length. To spice up his tired gossip, the author reprints a scurrilous and highly implausible anecdote from Zsa Zsa Gabor’s autobiography depicting Marilyn Monroe as an insatiable nymphomaniac.

As if it weren’t very old news, Staggs outs Eve as a gay cult film.. This tiresome way of interpreting the picture may seem significant to Staggs, but such an appreciation is irrelevant to the film’s intrinsic merits.

By magnifying the subtly implied lesbianism of Eve and terming “bi-sexual” both Eve’s conqueror, the vicious theater critic Addison De Witt, as well as the actor who portrayed him (George Sanders), Staggs gives All About Eve far more of a gay spin than it warrants.

Though Staggs calls Mankiewicz “a heterosexual trapped in a gay sensibility,” the writer-director would have deplored any “hint of mint.” Mankiewicz was a noted womanizer who was highly contemptuous of both male and female homosexuals. When I had occasion to compare him with George Cukor as a famed director of actresses, Mankiewicz cracked that “George only befriended female stars. I fucked them!” This may be one of the reasons why Mankiewicz made the hateful Eve a lesbian.

Manifestations of Eve’s lesbianism are only twice briefly discernible. First, after a duplicitous late-night phone call to lure the married playwright to her room, Eve links arms with the caller (her rooming-house mate) and, both dressed in night wear, they joyfully climb the stairs together. Second, in the final scene, Eve’s hostility towards a young intruder melts after “Phoebe” offers to spend the night.

A more important topic in the film concerns the conflict between Broadway’s prestige and Hollywood’s lucre. It was a source of profound ambivalence to Mankiewicz and it keeps cropping up throughout All About Eve, although it is overlooked by the author of this supposedly authoritative study.

The film was actually a valentine to the theater community which Mankiewicz yearned to join, rather than the poison-pen letter many mistook it for. Although Mankiewicz moved to New York in 1952, he never realized his great ambition to become a Broadway playwright. He did complete one full-length play, Jefferson Selleck–contrary to Mr. Staggs’ claim that he never finished one–and began many others which he failed to conclude.

Staggs perceives that “in structure, Eve is the offspring of Citizen Kane,” but he refers only to such similarities as their multiple narrators and duplicated scenes shot from different perspectives, which Mankiewicz envisaged for Eve but which Darryl Zanuck (the film’s producer as well as the head of Twentieth Century Fox) deleted. A more significant correspondence between Citizen Kane and All About Eve can be found in the rivalry between the films’ respective writers. Herman Mankiewicz won a 1941 screenwriting Oscar for Citizen Kane, which his younger brother, Joe, greatly coveted. (Significantly, All About Eve is framed by a gilded awards ceremony.) Joe owed his film career to Herman’s bringing him to Los Angeles in 1929 when he was only 20. In the 1940s, as Joe ascended the ladder of success which Herman was skidding down, the highly competitive Joe was continually nettled by being known in the film colony as Herman’s “younger and less witty brother.” Though a role reversal with his brother had taken place, he could never forget this sobriquet as Herman’s junior and lesser.

All About Eve may be based, in part, on Orr’s short story, but the ongoing competition between the younger and older Mankiewicz brothers provides its unconscious vitality. The picture’s combat between an aging star, Margo Channing (Bette Davis), and a gifted, ambitious, and strikingly younger upstart, Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter), is remarkably similar to the rivalry between Herman and Joe.

While Mr. Staggs puts Citizen Kane in his “pantheon of classic screenplays,” he fails to note how remarkable it is that the disparate but similar Mankiewicz brothers wrote two of the greatest American screenplays within a single decade.

Staggs claims that the film’s final image of Eve’s successor bowing to countless self-images, is a “mirror sequence” wholly “borrowed” from Orson Welles’ shattered mirror shoot-out at the end of The Lady from Shanghai. While Welles’ sequence is characteristically dynamic, Mankiewicz’s is static–albeit reverberant as a metaphor of youth’s inevitable succession. As usual, Staggs gets it wrong, and proves that he is to film journalism what Ed Wood was to filmmaking.