Universal's Touch of Evil.

"I have long championed the critical recording by James Naremore and Jonathan Rosenbaum on Criterion's The Complete Mr Arkadin as being one of the most pleasurable and informative DVD commentaries of recent years, and their new tag team recording on Universal's 50th anniversary edition of Touch of Evil (released today) is a worthy followup," writes Doug Cummings. "Watching the film again this year, it's a stunning example of socially relevant dramaturgy that centers not only on immigration issues that still dominate the headlines, but also highlights issues such as the ethics of tyrannical power and torture versus criminal rights and legal procedures that have been (or should have been) equally front and center in the mainstream conscience the past five years."

Updated through 10/10.

This is, though, one very controversial release. "The solution here, to make everyone happy, would be to include two presentation versions on the same release," writes Craig Keller in an open letter to producer Rick Schmidlin (who also oversaw the 1998 re-edit), "which would appease any functionaries who seek any excuse to release the thing in 'widescreen', and one version in open-matte 1.33 (not the current 1.85:1 image cropped further down to 1.33), which would make the compositions consistent with the core aesthetics of Welles's oeuvre (yes, I am aware of his in-certain-instances deliberate framing of particular films at 1.66), and consistent with the director's reflections on the aesthetics of framing as discussed in his (Welles's own) essay 'Ribbon of Dreams,' reproduced here."

Dave Kehr comments: "There's clearly no cut and dried answer here, in the absence of any documentary evidence, but my eye tells me that [the 1.85 aspect ratio is] too tight."

Meanwhile, at the Parallax View, Sean Axmaker posts his 1998 interviews with Schmidlin and film preservationist Bob O'Neil and stars Janet Leigh and Charlton Heston.

Update, 10/8: Sean adds an interview with Walter Murch to the collection.

Update, 10/9: Sean Axmaker puts the final touches on the Parallax View's whopping package.

Updates, 10/10: Tom Charity recounts the initial critical reaction to Touch of Evil and a chronology of the project, leading all the way up to this release. And: "Paul Schrader called Touch of Evil the epitaph for film noir, but we might as well say it's the epitaph for classical Hollywood and a launching pad for the nouvelle vague. Welles takes a routine potboiler and elevates it to a level of thematic complexity and style the genre can scarcely accommodate. The studio wanted a routine thriller, but Welles blew it up into something morally challenging, volatile, and subversive; a second-generation film that makes fun of its movie-ness even as it glories in it. We can see glints of Breathless and Shoot the Piano Player in this attitude to pulp, the story as a springboard for elaboration and play."

Also at Moving Image Source: "[M]any of those (especially males) who obsess on the 'meaning' of 'Orson' are actually looking for ways to negotiate their own narcissism and fantasies of omnipotence," writes Jonathan Rosenbaum. "It's part of the special insight of Richard Linklater's Me and Orson Welles, which premiered last month at the Toronto International Film Festival, to perceive and run with this aspect of the Welles myth, which is already implied in its title.... There's general agreement that Welles was self-absorbed. But one way of distinguishing mythopoeia from biography is whether or not his other distinguishing traits—such as his compulsive self-criticism (which could sometimes be even more severe than the charges of his detractors) and his desire to compensate for his self-absorption with certain forms of charm and generosity—are factored into the portrayal. Me and Orson Welles (film and novel) is intermittently attentive to the latter but completely oblivious to the former."

Posted by dwhudson at October 7, 2008 2:01 PM