Magician: The
Astonishing Life And Work Of Orson Welles. (12A.)
Directed by Chuck Workman.
Featuring Welles, Oja Kodar, Simon Callow, Peter Bogdanovich and Elvis Mitchell. 94 mins
It's that man again, Awesome Orson and it's That story again: the one about the child prodigy who became a theatre director in his teens; went to Hollywood and made a masterpiece; had his next film butchered by the studio and spent the rest of his life largely shunned by Hollywood, flitting around Europe trying to raise bits of money to do a bit more work on a project that most probably would never be finished.
Workman's telling is brisk, chronological and efficient. A comprehensive range of biographers, relatives, friends, co-workers and admirers are canvassed for their views. There are clips from all the films and films that he has influenced as well as any film that feature Welles as a character. Of course Welles himself always offers the most telling lines – whatever his failings he was always a top turn, never a press conference or chat show let down. The five chapters Workman imposes on his life – The Boy Wonder, The Outsider, The Gypsy, The Road Back, The Master – seem largely arbitrary and there's little heard here that hasn't been covered before. A lot of clips come from the 1982 BBC Arena special on Welles, which has never been bettered.
The only negative voice we hear is someone who went to school with complaining that he was an obnoxious kid, always showing off and that he was lacking in human empathy. Welles prodigeous gifts are well documented, and Magician is happy to regurgite the image of him as a martyred genius. Would it really have destroyed the image to delve a little more into this complex figure, discover the flaws that caused him to constantly live on the edge in a whirl of brinkmanship and charlatanism
The film is well titled because Welles' genius may be a matter of smoke and mirrors. It relies a lot on memories of things once seen and now not and imaginings of what might've been: that brief but unforgettable theatre production, the glimpse of footage from that film he never finished or the promise of what his version of the film was like before the studios got their hands on it and ruined it. It also helps that his films offer up magnificent clips – the mirror climax from Lady in Shanghai, the battle scene from Chimes At Midnight, the long opening tracking shot in Touch of Evil – that sometimes don't accurately represent the quality of the film as a whole. Ah yes but, if only you'd seen Orson's original version.
His quote that a film set, “is the biggest electric train set a boy ever had!,” gets repeated and you wonder if anyone has ever pointed out how completely wrong that quote is. If you are a billionaire and not too bothered about remaining so for long than buy a film studio and knock yourself out. For anyone else it is a very pricy tool that someone else is paying for. Film lovers never tire of the immortal story of how his great, flawed genius was hounded out by the money men. And it's a great story – as long as it isn't your money he was losing.
Directed by Chuck Workman.
Featuring Welles, Oja Kodar, Simon Callow, Peter Bogdanovich and Elvis Mitchell. 94 mins
It's that man again, Awesome Orson and it's That story again: the one about the child prodigy who became a theatre director in his teens; went to Hollywood and made a masterpiece; had his next film butchered by the studio and spent the rest of his life largely shunned by Hollywood, flitting around Europe trying to raise bits of money to do a bit more work on a project that most probably would never be finished.
Workman's telling is brisk, chronological and efficient. A comprehensive range of biographers, relatives, friends, co-workers and admirers are canvassed for their views. There are clips from all the films and films that he has influenced as well as any film that feature Welles as a character. Of course Welles himself always offers the most telling lines – whatever his failings he was always a top turn, never a press conference or chat show let down. The five chapters Workman imposes on his life – The Boy Wonder, The Outsider, The Gypsy, The Road Back, The Master – seem largely arbitrary and there's little heard here that hasn't been covered before. A lot of clips come from the 1982 BBC Arena special on Welles, which has never been bettered.
The only negative voice we hear is someone who went to school with complaining that he was an obnoxious kid, always showing off and that he was lacking in human empathy. Welles prodigeous gifts are well documented, and Magician is happy to regurgite the image of him as a martyred genius. Would it really have destroyed the image to delve a little more into this complex figure, discover the flaws that caused him to constantly live on the edge in a whirl of brinkmanship and charlatanism
The film is well titled because Welles' genius may be a matter of smoke and mirrors. It relies a lot on memories of things once seen and now not and imaginings of what might've been: that brief but unforgettable theatre production, the glimpse of footage from that film he never finished or the promise of what his version of the film was like before the studios got their hands on it and ruined it. It also helps that his films offer up magnificent clips – the mirror climax from Lady in Shanghai, the battle scene from Chimes At Midnight, the long opening tracking shot in Touch of Evil – that sometimes don't accurately represent the quality of the film as a whole. Ah yes but, if only you'd seen Orson's original version.
His quote that a film set, “is the biggest electric train set a boy ever had!,” gets repeated and you wonder if anyone has ever pointed out how completely wrong that quote is. If you are a billionaire and not too bothered about remaining so for long than buy a film studio and knock yourself out. For anyone else it is a very pricy tool that someone else is paying for. Film lovers never tire of the immortal story of how his great, flawed genius was hounded out by the money men. And it's a great story – as long as it isn't your money he was losing.