Filming 'Othello'

Filming 'Othello' (1978)

*** (out of 4)

This Orson Welles film isn't really a documentary but instead a video essay where the director talks about his film OTHELLO, the play that it was based on and various other things related to Shakespeare.

If you're familiar with the film in question then you'll know that it went through a variety of money issues and it actually took years to finish it. Welles, with that great voice, is on hand here, often just looking at the camera, as he talks about the various production issues and why the Turkish bath sequence was added to the film. He also talks about the play itself, the greatest of its words and finally he discusses how he wished the film had turned out.

If you're a fan of Welles or OTHELLO then you'll enjoy this film as there are some interesting stories told and there's no question that getting to listen to a master like Welles is a lot of fun. The highlight of the film is certainly him talking about the various money issues and the Turkish bath house was certainly quite fascinating.

This is just a wonderful doc on the making of Orson Welles's Othello. It's basically Orson Welles telling anecdotes about Othello for one hour, but the man is so captivating, funny, intelligent, charming and charismatic that is just a joy to watch for any film buff.

The final film of Orson Welles is perhaps his quietest, most reflective piece of work. "Filming Othello" is not, as the title might suggest, a "making of" documentary about putting the Shakespeare play onto film. Instead it falls into the somewhat vaguely-defined "essay film" category occupied by the likes of Welles' own "F for Fake", and perhaps the documentary work of Werner Herzog. This movie mostly consists of its director talking into his camera toward the audience, and occasionally playing clips of his "Othello", past conversations with other actors, interviews, etc. Formally, this film is not the most interesting in the world (which ironically, is where Welles has largely succeeded in the past in filmmaking), but here it's the content that is truly fascinating.

Nearly thirty years after putting his own version of "Othello" onto film, here we watch Welles look back onto it, recounting both tales of the production, his own interpretations of Shakespeare's original text and discussion with others on it, reaction to the film, and finally his own wish to have made it even better than it was. If this is not concerned with how to film Shakespeare, then what "Filming Othello" is concerned with is Welles himself, and his look back at an accomplishment in his life, and with the distance from it gained by history.

This film is Welles probing his own mind, where if in "F for Fake" he shares with us his philosophy on art in general, "Filming Othello" is his philosophy on creating and thinking about his own work. And yet there's a melancholic feeling all throughout the movie as Welles calmly but quietly reviews his past work. One gets the impression that here the legendary director of "Citizen Kane" who was willing to pick a fight with powerful newspaper tycoons at the mere age of 24 has finally been humbled by history, and that he has finally acknowledged his best days are behind him.

"Good night." Those are the words that Welles speaks to us at the film's very end, and they serve as a last, sad goodbye from a great artist, lamenting that he could not have done more.

A wonderful, private oration with Orson Welles for once talking about his vast visual artistry and visual imagery. Welles always shied away from discussing such things, that his fans would have much loved to hear. During his conversations with Peter Bogdanovich which became "This is Orson Welles," he speaks as if his visual style never had any thematic significance. It is wonderful to hear him finally talk about style and vindicate one for taking such joy in his visual motifs.

In the second half of the movie, Welles discusses the elements of the film which were dictated by practicality and necessity. Welles had to procure the funds for his Othello entirely himself, either from being paid to appear in other mens' movies, or from the odd backer who would contribute not nearly enough money. This meant production had to keep stopping and relocating across the world. Orson Welles was the first person in the history of cinema to make a movie not attached to a certain studio or even country! When it came to the Cannes film festival, Welles was stuck with what country to say the movie was of! He chose Morrocco for convenience, ironically where the character Othello was originally from. This makes Orson Welles' Othello the very first independent film, and Welles went on to become the founder of the independent film movement.

Also included is a reunion luncheon party with Hilton Edwards (Desdemona's father) and Michael Macliammoir (Iago). Following, Welles further discusses the play of Othello, performs a couple of key speeches from the play. The final segment is from a question time after a screening of Othello to film students.

As always, hearing Orson talk is marvellous to listen to. A wonderful, gentle coda to a boistrous film career.

It's odd now to think of this film and know that I really did enjoy it. I had the pleasure a few years back at the Seattle Art Museum. For the most part, the film is Welles and two old friends/actors from the original film sitting around a table and talking about filming Othello and past life experiences. And somehow it worked. Which proves Welles' genius, even in these conditions he could make a great film. It looks as though it was filmed in his living room, which is a sad reminder of the treatment he got in the last 20 (40?) years of his life. Although, like most Welles fanatics, I am eagerly awaiting the chance to see "The Other Side of the Wind", this is really a film worthy of his talents and, on many levels, an appropriate last film.