An entirely and completely odd movie, this one. It is a riot and for 1958 pushes it to the limit. I keep hearing B-Movie but it’s got an A-list cast, a combination of the past and the future. You’ve got a washed-up, bloated (to be polite) Welles looking just dreadful and Marlene Dietrich seemingly popping in and out of an opium haze. I have no idea why she is in this movie but she’s there. As is Zsa Zsa Gabor.
With Welles it’s once again the bravura cinematography and sound design. I always thought of Orson as Howard Hawks with a lot more edge, that within the confines of a bog-standard script he could unearth, indeed inject, a bit of madness and run with it like no other.
The border town here is the seediest wee town. It just defines sleaze. Almost every character is nuts or says something so silly it had to be Welles doing it for a laugh. The roaming camera is an addiction, and there is always something going on at the back or edge of frame. The story is constantly in motion yet we get hints of another narrative kicking off beyond the mise en scène. That’s a talent.
And I did not know until today that the character of Al Schwartz (District Attorney’s Assistant) is played by the same bloke who was the creepy Highway Patrol Officer in Psycho (1960). Take a bow, Mort Mills.
And I’m not the only one who can say that The Player (1992) and Get Shorty (1995) brought me to this wonderful motion picture. Cinema is a land of allusions.
Riot!
Wanderings and ... wonderings. 