What he creates, he has to wreck, it's a compulsion
August 31, 2018 4:58 AM Subscribe
Orson Welles' last movie is finally finished and comes out in November and the very '70s trailer is out today. Welles largely completed filming forty years ago but never got the funding to complete the edit and it was snarled in legal battles until recently when Netflix stepped in to pay to complete the film. (previously)
*smoking intensifies*
posted by thelonius at 5:28 AM on August 31, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by thelonius at 5:28 AM on August 31, 2018 [5 favorites]
That trailer was wonderful
posted by onetime dormouse at 5:42 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by onetime dormouse at 5:42 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Oh Christ, as much as I love Orson, I don't know if I can handle watching his entire entourage of sycophants cavort for a couple hours. Bogdanovich surely didn't allow any of his scenes to be trimmed, and even a little bit of Henry Jaglom is too much, but I can't really imagine passing up a last Welles movie, even if it isn't entirely what he'd have done. (Which is probably draw out the editing forever, so I guess I've already "seen" his version in a sense.)
posted by gusottertrout at 5:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by gusottertrout at 5:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [3 favorites]
That said, watching John Huston should be fun though.
posted by gusottertrout at 5:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gusottertrout at 5:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
I was reading about this movie yesterday and the making of it could be a movie in and of itself.
posted by gucci mane at 5:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gucci mane at 5:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm too broken by pop culture; in the back of my head the whole time I'm expecting this to turn out to be an extremely well-polished Eric Jonrosh film on IFC.
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:08 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:08 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
Bogdanovich surely didn't allow any of his scenes to be trimmed
Why would he have a say? He’s just an actor here. That said, I’d rather Bogdanovich had a go at it than the random gun-for-hire they did get (the guy who cut The Hurt Locker).
If you must have a villain, look no further than Oja Kodar, who by all accounts sabotaged the film’s completion at every turn.
posted by Sys Rq at 6:17 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Why would he have a say? He’s just an actor here. That said, I’d rather Bogdanovich had a go at it than the random gun-for-hire they did get (the guy who cut The Hurt Locker).
If you must have a villain, look no further than Oja Kodar, who by all accounts sabotaged the film’s completion at every turn.
posted by Sys Rq at 6:17 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Haha. This is going to be great:
We’re going to shoot it without a script,” Welles once explained to a group of possible financial backers, Karp wrote. “I know the whole story. … But what I’m going to do is get the actors in every situation, tell them what has happened up to this moment … and I believe they will find what is true and inevitable.”posted by notyou at 6:53 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Welles started shooting in spurts. Karp wrote that Welles rented out the MGM back lot for just $200 because he had his crew pretend to be UCLA film students. The director filmed for three years before he got around to casting his main character, eventually tapping famed Hollywood director John Huston to play his macho director.
Why would he have a say? He’s just an actor here.
Also an executive producer and one of primary movers in getting the film to the screen, which is certainly can be to his credit, but Bogdanovich is worse than nails on a chalkboard irritating to me. So don't take my comment too seriously other than for that. (I definitely wouldn't cast Kodar as a villain in this though since the fight between her and Beatrice Welles delaying the project and Welles will makes that a bit unfair I think. I don't want to see her get the Yoko treatment as the woman somehow holding back a "great man" as the men themselves didn't see them that way.)
posted by gusottertrout at 7:11 AM on August 31, 2018 [3 favorites]
Also an executive producer and one of primary movers in getting the film to the screen, which is certainly can be to his credit, but Bogdanovich is worse than nails on a chalkboard irritating to me. So don't take my comment too seriously other than for that. (I definitely wouldn't cast Kodar as a villain in this though since the fight between her and Beatrice Welles delaying the project and Welles will makes that a bit unfair I think. I don't want to see her get the Yoko treatment as the woman somehow holding back a "great man" as the men themselves didn't see them that way.)
posted by gusottertrout at 7:11 AM on August 31, 2018 [3 favorites]
Damn, there goes one more piece of random trivia - Orson Welles' final film is no longer Transformers: The Movie.
posted by Molesome at 7:26 AM on August 31, 2018 [15 favorites]
posted by Molesome at 7:26 AM on August 31, 2018 [15 favorites]
Is that Bogdanovich who looks a lot like Bill Hicks in the trailer?
posted by doctornemo at 7:57 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by doctornemo at 7:57 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
Since it appears those lost reels of The Magnificent Ambersons are never actually going to turn up in some attic in Brazil, I guess we'll have to settle for this. The footage looks amazing, but I'm not counting on it being entirely coherent. And the fact that most of the editing was done after his death makes it really only partially an Orson Welles film (especially as, in his later years, he considered editing the most important part of his filmmaking.) Still, I'm excited to finally see it on the big screen!
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:09 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:09 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
Is that Bogdanovich who looks a lot like Bill Hicks in the trailer?
Yes, though it's odd seeing him without the signature cravat.
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:12 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Yes, though it's odd seeing him without the signature cravat.
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:12 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Was looking forward to a very 70s trailer, was disappointed. Aside from Houston and a very young Bogdonavich, the trailer makes it look quite modern.
I'm curious to see it. But not much more. Also, find it interesting that Netflix pulled this off.
posted by 2N2222 at 9:30 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
I'm curious to see it. But not much more. Also, find it interesting that Netflix pulled this off.
posted by 2N2222 at 9:30 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
In this article from last year there's a clip of the producer discussing the restoration. I'm impressed that Netflix bankrolled this because other than for prestige I'm not sure what is in it for them. I doubt they'll make back their money.
but Bogdanovich is worse than nails on a chalkboard irritating to me.
Ha! At least Bogdanovich cares about Welles and his legacy. For me it is Henry Jaglom who I am always amazed has had a career of any kind.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:43 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
but Bogdanovich is worse than nails on a chalkboard irritating to me.
Ha! At least Bogdanovich cares about Welles and his legacy. For me it is Henry Jaglom who I am always amazed has had a career of any kind.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:43 AM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
Speaking of challenging last movies by dead auteurs, I noticed that Dennis Hopper's The Last Movie is finally getting a restoration and a release as well.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:52 AM on August 31, 2018 [2 favorites]
Oh, that's good. I've been wanting to see The Last Movie again. I really liked it when I saw it many years ago, but I was young and watching lot's of "psychedelic" or otherwise strange movies at the time that didn't fully make sense to me then, but seemed exciting for not doing so. Someday I'll have to make a point to revisit them to see how the some of that out there sixties and seventies stuff that's largely fallen by the way side holds up for me.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:15 AM on August 31, 2018
posted by gusottertrout at 10:15 AM on August 31, 2018
We will release no film until its time.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:18 AM on August 31, 2018 [11 favorites]
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:18 AM on August 31, 2018 [11 favorites]
I feel weirdly protective of Welles. I don't know why--I generally don't have the time of day for middlebrow icons. But he and Glenn Gould are my weaknesses, I guess. So I just hope it looks something like him.
posted by praemunire at 11:38 AM on August 31, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 11:38 AM on August 31, 2018 [4 favorites]
If this is just 90 minutes of Paul Masson commerical outtakes, I'm out.
posted by duffell at 7:53 PM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by duffell at 7:53 PM on August 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
No the outtakes are probably like something similar to but not entirely like this. (SLYT)
posted by Ignorantsavage at 8:48 PM on August 31, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by Ignorantsavage at 8:48 PM on August 31, 2018 [3 favorites]
It seems to be Welles month in my universe. A few weeks ago a friend lent me a Welles biography, Simon Callow's "The Road to Xanadu", published 1995. He said it was a good read and it is.
Another friend visited for a few days. We used to work in theatre together so I read her an excerpt from the chapter on "The Cradle Will Rock" and its famous premiere. We enjoyed that, and then we enjoyed Marc Blitzstein's account of it here.
She went home to Melbourne and a week later, last week, she sent me Josh Karp's "Orson Welles's Last Movie", published in 2015 and quoted above by notyou. She'd found it by chance in a remainder bin. This was timely. We hadn't been in contact since she left my place but coincidentally I had come across the trailer for the film just a day or two before the book arrived.
So I've been reading that (I'll get back on the road to Xanadu later) aaaand I've been rummaging in YouTube for Wellesian things. One in particular I like is the Paris interview from 1960. Once you get past the reverential intro and the fromagely Frenchy music .
Yesterday I found a recording of conversations between Bogdanovich and Welles from 1969 to 72. At around 1.33.31, they'd been talking about old age, Welles mentions "my story about an old director". Bogdanovich wants to hear more about it, Welles goes coy for a minute then obliges.
Today I was thinking about making some kind of post on the subject and discovered octothorpe had beaten me to it and you're all discussing it and I couldn't be happier because right now for me, this month, too much Welles is not enough.
posted by valetta at 6:05 AM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
Another friend visited for a few days. We used to work in theatre together so I read her an excerpt from the chapter on "The Cradle Will Rock" and its famous premiere. We enjoyed that, and then we enjoyed Marc Blitzstein's account of it here.
She went home to Melbourne and a week later, last week, she sent me Josh Karp's "Orson Welles's Last Movie", published in 2015 and quoted above by notyou. She'd found it by chance in a remainder bin. This was timely. We hadn't been in contact since she left my place but coincidentally I had come across the trailer for the film just a day or two before the book arrived.
So I've been reading that (I'll get back on the road to Xanadu later) aaaand I've been rummaging in YouTube for Wellesian things. One in particular I like is the Paris interview from 1960. Once you get past the reverential intro and the fromagely Frenchy music .
Yesterday I found a recording of conversations between Bogdanovich and Welles from 1969 to 72. At around 1.33.31, they'd been talking about old age, Welles mentions "my story about an old director". Bogdanovich wants to hear more about it, Welles goes coy for a minute then obliges.
Today I was thinking about making some kind of post on the subject and discovered octothorpe had beaten me to it and you're all discussing it and I couldn't be happier because right now for me, this month, too much Welles is not enough.
posted by valetta at 6:05 AM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
If you're looking for a little more Welles to add to your month, you might be interested in this short film he stars in, narrates, and had totally nothing to do with directing it, nope, not a thing. It's a somewhat slight but charming ghost story called Return to Glennascaul and is only 22 minutes long, free to watch on youtube.
posted by gusottertrout at 7:40 AM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gusottertrout at 7:40 AM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
... had totally nothing to do with directing it, nope, not a thing.
Are you sure?
Are you sure?
That was delightful. Thanks gusottertrout.
posted by valetta at 11:19 PM on September 13, 2018
Are you sure?
Are you sure?
That was delightful. Thanks gusottertrout.
posted by valetta at 11:19 PM on September 13, 2018
Heh. It's always an open question with any film Welles appears in as to how much influence he had on the directing as he'd, at the least, often badger the assigned director over how to shoot his scenes, and often seemed to perhaps have had even more involvement than that considering the, um, uncanny likeness to other Welles films. See, for example, the Jane Eyre that Welles was in, or the Tyrone Power films Prince of Foxes and The Black Rose. Prince of Foxes even has Everett Sloane, Mr. Bernstein from Kane, basically steal the show with Welles able assistance as Cesare Borgia. (The Black Rose isn't quite as Wellesy, but has it's moments.) Even as late as 1971, Harry Kümel was complaining of Welles trying to, essentially, take over the direction of his own scenes in Malpertuis using whatever leverage he could wrangle, being uncooperative in his acting when he didn't like the choices made in directing for example. Almost any film Welles appears in is worth watching not just to see him act, but to see what else he may have got a chance to mess with.
posted by gusottertrout at 11:47 PM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gusottertrout at 11:47 PM on September 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
Not to go on too much, but since I love this stuff I feel a bit compelled to add this segment from Trent's Last Case someone was kind enough to post to youtube. Welles character doesn't appear in the movie until an hour into it, and when he does, the tone of the film shifts noticeably. (His "entrance" is shown in this clip on TCM.)
The second clip in the parentheses gives some idea of Welles effect on the movie, the coy refusal to actually provide full view of him at first, just his arm and the smoke from his cigar while we hear him disclaim, before finally giving us our first look at him through dramatic in one of Welles typically ridiculous make up jobs he so liked to use, before eventually getting a shot where one of the characters comes to the foreground keeping the other two in focus behind him, emphasizing the depth of field for the shot maintaining viewer attention on all three character to give the scene added weight. It's Wellesian, but not nearly so suggestive of his influence as the first scene linked, with it's staircase scene, showing Welles character at the bottom of the stairs from the perspective of the woman he is talking to at the top. It's a set up he used in both Kane and Ambersons to similar effect, giving a visual analog for the relationship dynamic.
As the scene continues there is a bit of a mix of standard filming and cutting choices, the character speaking in close up then cut to the other when they speak, bookended by a bit more interesting choices of having both characters in the frame, first with Welles character speaking with his back to us leading into the close ups, and then with the woman coming into the frame partially blocking our view of Welles making his kiss seem more imposing then it would in a normal set up. The final extended scene in the car though is not only baroquely lit as Welles so often liked, but held in a two shot where we can see both men for an extended amount of time, building the tension which comes in part from Welles reciting Shakespeare, lines from Othello no less, which was the movie he'd just completed directing before appearing in this one.
How much of that is coincidence, I can't entirely say, I mean the Othello lines could have been what sparked interest in casting Welles, but the influence on the filming of his scenes seems pretty unmistakable, especially given the actual director, Henry Wilcox, didn't show much propensity for adventure in the other movies of his I've seen. That Welles worked with him again a couple years later on Trouble in the Glen, a movie I haven't seen, but that has this scene also with something of a Wellesian flavor to it seems like he was getting some added satisfaction from his work with Wilcox. But, then again, any time Welles is on screen his very demeanor so warps the rest of the movie to his presence and connects them to his other films that some of this could just be a gravitational fluctuation with lesser bodies getting caught in the pull.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:20 AM on September 14, 2018 [2 favorites]
The second clip in the parentheses gives some idea of Welles effect on the movie, the coy refusal to actually provide full view of him at first, just his arm and the smoke from his cigar while we hear him disclaim, before finally giving us our first look at him through dramatic in one of Welles typically ridiculous make up jobs he so liked to use, before eventually getting a shot where one of the characters comes to the foreground keeping the other two in focus behind him, emphasizing the depth of field for the shot maintaining viewer attention on all three character to give the scene added weight. It's Wellesian, but not nearly so suggestive of his influence as the first scene linked, with it's staircase scene, showing Welles character at the bottom of the stairs from the perspective of the woman he is talking to at the top. It's a set up he used in both Kane and Ambersons to similar effect, giving a visual analog for the relationship dynamic.
As the scene continues there is a bit of a mix of standard filming and cutting choices, the character speaking in close up then cut to the other when they speak, bookended by a bit more interesting choices of having both characters in the frame, first with Welles character speaking with his back to us leading into the close ups, and then with the woman coming into the frame partially blocking our view of Welles making his kiss seem more imposing then it would in a normal set up. The final extended scene in the car though is not only baroquely lit as Welles so often liked, but held in a two shot where we can see both men for an extended amount of time, building the tension which comes in part from Welles reciting Shakespeare, lines from Othello no less, which was the movie he'd just completed directing before appearing in this one.
How much of that is coincidence, I can't entirely say, I mean the Othello lines could have been what sparked interest in casting Welles, but the influence on the filming of his scenes seems pretty unmistakable, especially given the actual director, Henry Wilcox, didn't show much propensity for adventure in the other movies of his I've seen. That Welles worked with him again a couple years later on Trouble in the Glen, a movie I haven't seen, but that has this scene also with something of a Wellesian flavor to it seems like he was getting some added satisfaction from his work with Wilcox. But, then again, any time Welles is on screen his very demeanor so warps the rest of the movie to his presence and connects them to his other films that some of this could just be a gravitational fluctuation with lesser bodies getting caught in the pull.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:20 AM on September 14, 2018 [2 favorites]
Demeanour in spades, but oh Mr.Manderson, those eyebrows!
The scene in the car with the passages from Othello - the kind person who posted it on YT thought it was quite odd "in managing to make the quoting of random Shakespeare sound somewhat threatening." Not random quotes, surely, in a tale of jealousy and murder.
But visually, yes, odd. The car just windscreen and a bit of bonnet. The scenery moving at a rapid clip and the car still, open top but no breeze, just the camera moving slowly back and forth. No engine noise, quiet voices, Welles lit like Mephistopheles. It certainly served to focus our attention on the conversation, which we needed if we were to enjoy every nuance and insinuation. But it was sure at odds with the conventional naturalism of the other scenes. Which makes me wonder, Welles might have suggested how to set up the montage and they did their best but didn't quite pull it off.
posted by valetta at 5:31 AM on September 14, 2018
The scene in the car with the passages from Othello - the kind person who posted it on YT thought it was quite odd "in managing to make the quoting of random Shakespeare sound somewhat threatening." Not random quotes, surely, in a tale of jealousy and murder.
But visually, yes, odd. The car just windscreen and a bit of bonnet. The scenery moving at a rapid clip and the car still, open top but no breeze, just the camera moving slowly back and forth. No engine noise, quiet voices, Welles lit like Mephistopheles. It certainly served to focus our attention on the conversation, which we needed if we were to enjoy every nuance and insinuation. But it was sure at odds with the conventional naturalism of the other scenes. Which makes me wonder, Welles might have suggested how to set up the montage and they did their best but didn't quite pull it off.
posted by valetta at 5:31 AM on September 14, 2018
Heh, yeah. you can't even really tell who's driving or if the car is in fact being driven as the landscape behind it seems to be moving in ways that have nothing to do with the operation of the vehicle.
I think the odd thing here might be as much a mix of styles rather than a failure of one exactly. It looked to me that the staircase scene, for example, had been kinda planned as having a different flow to it, but some insert reaction shots were added to give it a little more conventionality. I suspect Welles wouldn't mind the theatricality of the driving scene, might even greatly approve of it, but mixed with the more standard seeming elements it comes off as odder than it would if the rest of the movie matched it better. That's just a guess though, it certainly could be something else entirely.
posted by gusottertrout at 5:47 AM on September 14, 2018
I think the odd thing here might be as much a mix of styles rather than a failure of one exactly. It looked to me that the staircase scene, for example, had been kinda planned as having a different flow to it, but some insert reaction shots were added to give it a little more conventionality. I suspect Welles wouldn't mind the theatricality of the driving scene, might even greatly approve of it, but mixed with the more standard seeming elements it comes off as odder than it would if the rest of the movie matched it better. That's just a guess though, it certainly could be something else entirely.
posted by gusottertrout at 5:47 AM on September 14, 2018
Maybe half the crew was off with the flu. Anyhow, all that said and surmised, the dialogue was rivetting, such menace. So who killed Mr. Manderson? Mrs. M, Marlowe, other?
posted by valetta at 6:15 AM on September 14, 2018
posted by valetta at 6:15 AM on September 14, 2018
Here's a 2015 interview with Josh Karp, the author of "Orson Welles's Last Movie", starts at 1.35.52. Interesting to hear all about the making of the book about the making of the movie.
posted by valetta at 6:35 AM on September 14, 2018
posted by valetta at 6:35 AM on September 14, 2018
So who killed Mr. Manderson? Mrs. M, Marlowe, other?
Oh, other, in a fairly convoluted way, but that was what gave the story the movie was based on much of its notice I gather, without having read the book myself, as it's sort of a send up of the detective genre.
Thanks for the interview link!
posted by gusottertrout at 7:56 AM on September 14, 2018
Oh, other, in a fairly convoluted way, but that was what gave the story the movie was based on much of its notice I gather, without having read the book myself, as it's sort of a send up of the detective genre.
Thanks for the interview link!
posted by gusottertrout at 7:56 AM on September 14, 2018
Oh, and something I didn't know until looking up info on the book, was that the line about seeing Othello at the St James Theater and not liking the lead actor much was about Welles own staging of the play at St James Theater with, of course, Welles himself being the lead actor.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:10 AM on September 14, 2018
posted by gusottertrout at 8:10 AM on September 14, 2018
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For a very 70's film I have no doubt. But it's going to be a fascinating watch. The fact that John Huston stars is ironic, because whenever I think of "old guard Hollywood directors doing avant garde movies", I think back to watching "Wise Blood" for the first time years ago and being gobsmacked when I saw that John friggin Huston directed it.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 5:13 AM on August 31, 2018 [5 favorites]