By Jeff Swindoll Nov 1, 2006, 13:53 GMT
“God, How They’ll Love me when I’m Dead!” No truer words have been spoken about Orson Welles than his own. Orson Welles began a charmed life, created a film that’s become known as THE film, and was considered a “has been” by his twentieth birthday.
In fact Welles would carry the baggage of the trials and tribulations of Citizen Kane around himself as Marley’s Ghost carried the chains of his earthly sins. Money is the ruling factor in Hollywood and Welles’ perceived reputation would see that funding for his later films would vanish as much dust in the wind. Many books have been written about Welles (and one is sure many more will be).
However, author Joseph McBride perhaps trumps most of them because he actually had the opportunity to meet his subject. In fact, McBride had the opportunity to be the object of the direction of one of the world’s greatest directors (a title awarded, prophetically, after the great man’s demise). Some biographers are rather dismissive of the later period in Welles’ life, McBride quotes one who in a paragraph says that nothing good came out of this timeframe and basically says the less said about it the better (excellent author’s trick however since now you can effectively cease writing).
McBride chronicles the final period of Orson Welles’ directorial output, 1970-1985. It also has an unbeatable air of authenticity since for some of that time period McBride was playing a role in Welles’ unfinished, unseen film The Other Side of the Wind. Welles output in this time period fascinates me, unlike that other pesky biographer, because some of it IS unseen. Isn’t the curiosity always provoked by the things that we can’t see? Take The Other Side of the Wind.
This has the makings of being Welles final masterpiece. It’s a film about a film and full of smoke, mirrors, and Welles’ commentary on Hollywood. From the sound of things, it was trying to do what Altman’s The Player accomplished and was lauded for, but Orson Welles was a director who was always ahead of his time. McBride weaves a delightful yarn about both Welles and his final, mostly unfinished works and tells of Welles’ associations with cameraman Gary Graver, muse Oja Kodar, and Peter Bogdanovich.
Could it be that Welles’ final genius was not completing some of these films in this time period to keep the avid film buffs appetite and curiosity whet to want to see these works? Joseph McBride leads us through this time period with his eyewitness account and recounting of projects both done and undone. This book is a must have for the Wellesian scholar (or worshipper), fans of old Hollywood, or those looking for insight into the mind of directors. It is a fascinating look at a larger than life filmmaking genius that was always ahead of his time and a highly recommended read.
View blog reactions
There are currently no comments for this article. Be the first to comment! (no registration required)
Advertising
There are currently no comments for this article. Be the first to comment! (no registration required)