Touch Of Evil (50th Anniversary Edition)

well worth seeing. A Wells classic, that just has not aged

Touch of Evil (Orson Welles, 1958)

The American Experience documentary The Battle Over Citizen Kane concludes with the observation that after the scandal that erupted over Kane, Orson Welles "never worked on another major Hollywood production." Which is pretty amazing, when you consider how many of Welles' post-Kane movies are acknowledged as classics nowadays. After Kane, Welles plunged himself deep into the world of noir (one wonders what Jung would have to say about that) and continued cranking out fantastic movies. Seventeen years later, Welles made his second-best movie-- Touch of Evil, the very epitome of the things that make noir great.

Mike Vargas (Charlton Heston) is a Mexican (yeah, yeah, but suspend your disbelief) narcotics officer who's just gotten married to Susan (Janet Leigh), a Philadelphia socialite. On the eve of their honeymoon, someone plants a bomb in the car of a rich American on the Mexican side of the border, and the bomb explodes on the American side. This brings Vargas into contact with Hank Quinlan (Welles), a corrupt, racist American detective who tries to railroad Manelo Sanchez (Victor Millan, last seen in Scarface), the victim's daughter's boyfriend, by planting evidence at the crime scene. Vargas, meanwhile, is also being pursued by Joe Grandi (Justine's Akim Tamiroff), a crime boss whose brother Vargas arrested. All the threads eventually come together in the most entertaining of ways; the movie's climactic scene has been copied (and parodied) so many times that by now it's a cliché. But remember that it wasn't in 1958; this is as good as it gets.

Orson Welles' directorial prowess was as legendary as his excesses. Rent a Welles movie at random, and you're pretty much guaranteed a good time. Some of his movies, though, deliver more universally than others; Citizen Kane seems to be the favorite of most folks. Mine has always been The Stranger. But Touch of Evil stands with both. This is great stuff, an absolute must for film fans. **** ½

"Touch of Evil" is the movie that ended Orson Welles' reign in Hollywood, a huge failure at the time of its release. Now, it's considered his 2nd best film (hopefully I don't need to tell you what #1 is). "Touch of Evil" is a slice of film-noir, written and directed by Welles', set in Los Robles, a Mexican-American border town. As the movie opens (in one of the best shots I've ever seen) with an unbroken shot lasting three minutes and twenty seconds, a bomb is placed in a car. The camera follows the car, but stops as we're introduced to a newlywed couple: Mike Vargas (Charlton Heston), a Mexican narcotics official and his wife Susan (Janet Leigh). As they're going through a border checkpoint, the car drives past them and then we hear an off-screen explosion. As the police descend upon the scene like vultures, the tension slowly builds as we wait for Captain Hank Quinlan (Welles). The Welles' we finally see is quite different from the Welles' that once played Charles Foster Kane. The new Welles' is a fat, sweaty man who seems to be standing above the camera in almost every shot he's in. Quinlan comes in and states that the explosion was caused by dynamite, he cites "intuition" as his proof. As Vargas gets involved with the investigation, much to the dismay of Quinlan, Susan is set up at a secluded motel. Meanwhile, a local crime boss named "Uncle Joe" Grandi (Akim Tamiroff) is trying to harm Susan because Vargas is testifying against his brother and harming Vargas directly will get his brother convicted. Meanwhile, we watch as Quinlan investigates the explosion and realize that he has his own agenda. He's a dirty cop, distraught over the unsolved murder of his wife, who has no problem planting evidence to get someone arrested. One of the best scenes in the movie (which seems to reflect a passage from Welles' own life) is when Quinlan, drunk, goes to see a fortune-telling madam (Marlene Dietrich). The scene reads as follows:
Welles-Come on, read my future for me.
Dietrich-You haven't got any.
Welles-Uhh...What do you mean?
Dietrich-Your future is all used up.
"Touch of Evil" is a film that embodies what film-noir is supposed to be. Dark cinematography and low camera angles and there's a lot of that. This DVD is a terrific edition. The story behind the making of "Touch of Evil" is almost as well known as the film itself. After the studio drastically re-edited the film, Welles' wrote a pleading 58-page memo to the studio. Now, all these years later, we see the version that Welles' wanted. The cinematography of this film is an absolute gem. There are a lot of legendary and very well done shots that should rank up there with the best Gregg Toland shots in "Citizen Kane." Touch of Evil is a terrific, underrated film by "The Boy Genius."
GRADE: A-

I have read reviews on this site suggesting that this dvd release cropped the top and bottom of the original aspect ratio. I have seen the late '90s release of Touch Of Evil in the theater. I remember the top and bottom of the Universal globe was (slightly) chopped off of this theatrical release and looks just like the aspet ratio of this dvd release. I believe this dvd portrays the aspect ratio accurately. Besides, I have never heard of movies in the late 1950's released in the theaters having a "square" or "television" type of aspect ratio like most movies released in the 30's and 40's.

Orson Welles' "Touch of Evil" is a complex, ironic examination of the relationship between the law and justice... The film must stand beside the very best in detectives genre...

Its enormous confused tracking shots, its low angles, its tormented lighting, its obscure intelligent photography, its great use of the wide-angle lens, its hard complexity and complete fictional night-city word, all represent a brilliant essay of pure cinema establishing Welles as an alarming genius, one of the greatest filmmakers with movies years ahead of their time...

"Touch of Evil" is an outstanding achievement of a great cinematic mind, displaying a powerful range of Gothic expressionism... Welles' first appearance as a corrupt used-up Texas police captain (Hank Quinlan) is no less surprising...

A police car comes to a stop to the scene of a murder and unexpectedly there is Welles, sitting in the back seat: gross, unshaven, sweaty, and with a cigar clenched between his teeth... He seems a repellent person, with "intuition," manifesting that sensation of evil, as no crime movie has managed to do since, a suggestion of corruption that is the key to the fascinating and doubtful character he plays... Welles character will cheat, lie and murder in order to prevent the truth from emerging... One hates his toughness, yet one still understands him and feels pity for him than for his victims...

Joseph Calleia, his slightly more presentable assistant, is like Dana Andrews in Otto Preminger's "Where the Sidewalks Ends," a villain with unchanged methods: he waits, watches, leaves the police work to others, remains loyal to his profession and to his boss--but could not exist without him, or in another environment...

From that moment, we are caught between admiration of his brilliant directorial effects and fascination with his characterization of Quilan, a chief able to make a quick arrest by the simple expedient of framing the most likely suspects... He appears to have been using the techniques for years, but before this he has usually fitted the frame round the guilty party... It is a performance which frequently gives great energy to the screen...

Stanley Kubrick once said that the first shot of a movie should be the most captivating... Definitely, Welles' legendary opening shot satisfies one of the key requirements of the movie mystery... Of course, Russ Metty deserves a lot of credit...

The long traveling shot starts with a close-up of a time-bomb being placed in the trunk of a car by a shadowy figure, then, the richest man in town (Rudy Lanniker) and his mistress appearing from the background, getting into the car and driving away across the border from Mexico to the United States and through the border town... By this time the roving camera--that seems never to come to a standstill, has offered to us long view of the surroundings (crumbling arches, peeling walls, poor hotels and night clubs and a lot of trash) which will enclose the plot...

While the convertible stops at a crossroad, the camera descends swiftly to introduce a Mexican gentleman, an idealistic justice department lawyer Ramon Vargas (Charlton Heston) and his bride, the blonde American Susan (Janet Leigh) walking toward the frontier...

The superlative camera tracks the couple for some time, catching again the car as both Vargas and the automobile meet at the U.S. Customs post... We see and hear a conversation between Vargas, his wife and the border guard as the vehicle moves out of the frame... We proceed with the couple about to cross the border until the bomb goes off and the car explodes... The killing is the start of the conflict between policemen from both sides of the border...

"Touch of Evil" is great and memorable for the distinguished description of its scenes, its images, its acting and its sound track... Its importance lies entirely in how the event is told 'not' in the message or material...

In addition to its wonderful opening, the film contains other outstanding sequences:

- The deplorable ambiance of a closed nightclub where Marlene Dietrich wisely advises Welles to "lay off the candy bars." "Honey, you're a mess", she says when she finally recognizes Quinlan, and (at the end of the picture) when he asks "Come on, read my future for me," she replies: "You haven't got any. Your future is all used up. Why you don't go home."

- The single shot (in the murder suspect's apartment) where Welles handles his cast with great skill... There is much overlapping conversation as everyone talks at once, and half a dozen characters are brilliantly delineated...

- When the camera meets a group of three characters crossing the street across a hotel lobby and into a restricted elevator, and rides with them slowly up to the second floor until Vargas, who has left them in the lobby, reappears at the very moment the elevator door reopens...

- The horrifying siege of Leigh at the isolated Mirador Motel by a gang of young punks...

Perhaps the finest things about "Touch of Evil" is the cold, strange and unsympathetic atmosphere of its night city (narcotics, gang-rape, racism, prostitution) an almost universal corruption...

It's unlikely that there will ever be a more unpleasant or offensive or disgusting detective than Welles or a more fascinating one...

Watch for Mercedes McCambridge in it... but look quickly, or it will be too late.