They'll Love Me When I'm Dead

Orson Welles

Orson Welles on the set

Orson Welles on the set with Peter Bogdanovich

Orson Welles on the set with Peter Bogdanovich and John Huston

Orson Welles on the set

Orson Welles with John Huston

Left to right, John Huston, Orson Welles, and Peter Bogdanovich

Left to right, Peter Bogdanovich in shadows, Orson Welles, and John Huston

Left to right, Dennis Hopper, John Ford, and John Huston

Left to right, Orson Welles, Peter Bogdanovich, and John Huston

Left to right, Orson Welles, Peter Bogdanovich, Oja Kodar, and Gary Graver

THEY’LL LOVE ME WHEN I’M DEAD               B                    

USA  (98 mi)  2018  d:  Morgan Neville

Struck by the inventiveness of Welles’ own F for Fake (1973), where the director felt he was creating not so much a documentary but a “new kind of film,” Neville modeled this documentary on that film.  Made by the director of 2013 Top Ten List # 8 20 Feet from Stardom, this is equally as entertaining, released on Netflix as an accompaniment to the long unfinished work of Welles, The Other Side of the Wind (2018), which is a histrionic look at what might have been, as it was left to others, namely editor Bob Murawski, to finish what amounted to 100 hours of unedited film and the result is impressive, though likely too avant-garde for a commercial audience and hardly a masterwork worthy of being called a Welles film.  This moody hodgepodge of self-reflective commentary is at the heart of Welles’ film, which is itself an autobiographical documentary on the difficulties of making of a film, largely improvised, shot over five years, where the mirror reflections of what transpired in Welles’ own life trying to complete the film are simply remarkable, as he was never able to complete the film due to a lack of funding, as it completely dried up after the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in 1979, as the primary financier was the Shah’s brother in law, a Paris-based Iranian production operated by Mehdi Boushehri, with the new Iranian regime headed by Ayatollah Khomeini impounding the film along with all assets of the previous regime, and when brought to French court, they ruled that the film was owned by the producer, not the director, and impounded the original negative of the film, locked in a vault, completely inaccessible to Welles during his lifetime (though he smuggled out a print), dying in 1985 prior to completing the film.  When his estranged widow Paola Mori died the following year, the Welles estate was turned over to his daughter Beatrice Welles, and it was up to her to untangle the legal shenanigans that took more than two decades.  Making matters even more difficult, Welles left the controlling rights of all his unfinished film projects to Oja Kodar, his longtime companion, mistress and collaborator who co-wrote and co-starred in The Other Side of the Wind.  The contentious relationship between Oja Kodar and Beatrice Welles (who believed Kodar destroyed her mother’s marriage), each supposedly speaking for the true motives of the infamous director, led to a stalemate and power struggle that prevented any restoration and distribution of the film until Netflix got involved as late as 2017, with the original prints shipped from Paris to Los Angeles for a final restoration more than forty years after the shooting stopped, hiring a post-production team that included Bob Murawski as editor, Scott Millan as sound mixer, and Mo Henry as negative cutter.  Welles himself is seen waxing eloquently about the art of making movies, inspired by his belief in “divine accidents” that inevitably occur, claiming it is the director’s role to manage these unintended consequences.  Welles on camera is always viewed as a larger-than-life, Falstaff-like Shakespearean character with that deep resonant bass voice, a consummate showman, continually hyping a sales pitch for his latest idea or movie, all designed to promote interest in his latest project. 

With the overwhelming success of CITIZEN KANE (1941), many regarding it as the greatest film ever made, Welles was quickly blindsided by the Hollywood power elite who managed to get him sent out of the country as a goodwill ambassador to Brazil at the behest of Nelson Rockefeller, U.S. Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs and a principal stockholder in RKO Radio Pictures, shooting a documentary there which produced the beautifully unfinished film IT’S ALL TRUE (1943).  While out of the country his next film was sabotaged, THE MAGNIFICENT ANDERSONS (1942), with the studio heads thinking the ending was too downbeat, so they destroyed the final prints and brought in the actors to reshoot the ending, with the lost footage still the stuff of legends, one of the colossal betrayals in Hollywood history, as no one will ever see the final vision conceived by the artist himself.  This betrayal destroyed whatever future Welles had in Hollywood and was a blow from which he never recovered, exiled to Europe in order to procure financing for his films in the 50’s and 60’s, as money completely dried up in the United States, so it was this film project that lured him back to Los Angeles, spending the last 15 years of his life there obsessed with the making of this film, confident it would resurrect his career and lead to a breakthrough, finally achieving the success he felt he deserved after all these years.  But that envisioned Hollywood ending was not to be, as evidenced by the heartbreak that followed what he thought was a door opening when he was awarded a lifetime achievement award at the American Film Institute in 1975, basking in the limelight of a room filled with stars and the Hollywood elite, receiving a standing ovation, screening two scenes from the film, all but imploring this august group for money to complete the film, but no one offered a penny.  It’s easily the saddest moment of the film, especially since he grew so euphoric at the prospect of a successful return.  The hypocrisy, of course, is that they’d recognize him with an award while still refusing to offer him work, continuing a pattern that existed for thirty years.  Similarly, the ultimate irony is that the prestigiously elite team of Hollywood specialists required to restore this film forty years after his death is way more extravagant than Welles would have required to finish the film himself.  It’s likely sometime late in life that he was alleged to have spoken the words of the film title as a befitting epitaph, as it’s completely in character with his morbid humor.  The clips of Welles that are splintered throughout the film are deliciously revealing, as he’s so in command of being in front of a camera, like a youthfully exuberant ham that never knows when to stop ogling for more laughs, but it shows just how comfortable he is in his own skin.  Revealing more about Welles than any other documentary, this also shows how much we miss him, as he remains curious and constantly inventive, seemingly with so much to offer, yet his life was filled with such disappointment, which may explain why he ballooned in weight in his final years, where the sad and pathetic reality is that his regular source of income was largely accumulated by becoming a pitchman for a variety of TV commercials.         

When Welles concocted his plan to return to America in 1970, Hollywood was changing, as the power of the studios was dissipating and it was becoming a youth market targeting the younger generation, with films like Bonnie and Clyde (1967), MIDNIGHT COWBOY (1969),  Easy Rider (1969), Five Easy Pieces (1970), Two-Lane Blacktop (1971), The Last Movie (1971), or McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971), a time when Welles was viewed with reverence in Europe and by this new generation, described as “somewhere between a Zen master and God,” where he should have been welcomed like a conquering hero, as John Huston was with THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING (1975), yet he never completed another picture.  At the time he was living in the Beverly Hills Hotel, which was not concealed from the public, so up and coming cinematographer Gary Graver enthusiastically gave him a call expressing a desire to work with him.  Using a montage of his own collected films, Neville amusingly reassembles his telephone response, giving it a dramatic life or death urgency, testing the young cameraman in his hotel suite, agreeing on the spot to work with him, as he had a reputation for working fast and cheap, which turned into a Mephistophelean deal with the devil, with Graver having no life of his own after that, working with Welles for the next 15 years (the only person to work for both Welles and Ed Wood), ruining his family life by literally being worked to the ground for no pay, going to desperate measures, working in the porn industry under an assumed alias to earn a living, where in a hilarious moment Welles is seen ingeniously helping edit a porn film in order to get Graver back working for him.  Another interesting tidbit is Welles working with the comic impressionist Rich Little on his own television program, becoming enamored with his talent, an odd couple, to be sure, offering him a role in the film that was later filled by American director Peter Bogdanovich, as Little had a small window of opportunity to shoot with no possibility of working beyond a cutoff date, as he had touring commitments.  Welles took a gamble and nearly completed what he needed, but fell short, having to toss all that footage and start all over again with Bogdanovich.  That was really the beginning of the end on this project, as things started taking a turn for the worse.  This documentary, however, is unique in showing plenty of footage of Rich Little on the set that is not present in the film.  Bogdanovich, interestingly, does several impressions of Rich Little doing an impression.  Welles’ connection to Bogdanovich mirrors his own career, as Bogdanovich was the wonder boy whose first film was the highly acclaimed The Last Picture Show (1971), discovering a young 19-year old Cybill Shepherd, having an affair with her, with Welles curiously casting a young teenage blond in his own film meant to resemble her, Cathy Lucas as Mavis Henscher, though embraced by the aging director John Huston who lasciviously takes her under his wing.  Bogdanovich went on to have plenty of success before his career mysteriously fizzled out, exactly like Welles, and hasn’t had a hit movie in decades, though he recently completed a documentary on Buster Keaton, The Great Buster (2018).  It’s sadly curious that in the decade of making this film, both Huston and Bogdanovich were lauded by Hollywood for their work, but Welles was routinely ignored, becoming so desperate for an editing machine that he literally moved into Bogdanovich’s editing studio in the basement of his home, not for three weeks, as was expected, but for three years, happening during a particularly difficult turn in Bogdanovich’s career, becoming a huge strain on their friendship.  Interesting that Bogdanovich began as a young cinephile enthusiast idolizing Welles, recalling the morning Welles called telling him to meet on a roadway next to a runway at the Los Angeles airport, doing Jerry Lewis impressions for him during the shoot, then successfully directing his own films, with Welles moving into his own house in no hurry to move on.  Believing he was creating a masterpiece, though “maybe it’s just people talking about a movie,” the painful legacy of Welles’ film is beautifully detailed in this film, which is easier to follow and arguably much more enjoyable to watch than the doomed picture Welles shot.      

The Last Picture Show

THE LAST PICTURE SHOW          A                 
USA  (118 mi)  1971  d:  Peter Bogdanovich

A darkly layered melancholic film adapted from the Larry McMurtry novel which has the true ring of authenticity stamped over every frame of the film, and don’t we wish films could be this refreshingly honest today, particularly the inhibitions to tell the truth about sex?  Featuring a first rate cast, set in a small windblown west Texas town where you either work for the oil industry or you don’t work at all, where there’s next to nothing to do, so the entire town comes out to support the local high school football team every week and then lives or dies with their efforts.  Filmed by Robert Surtees in Black and White, the town looks worn out and lived in before anything happens, where the flatness of the land extends in all directions beyond the horizon, where there is the feeling of no escape from this predicament where the same thing is likely to happen week after week.  Only death brings change, as otherwise humans are tiny specks on the landscape.  Seen through the eyes of high school kids who haven’t a clue what to expect other than a grilled cheeseburger with onions and a coke, the older ones around them, in contrast, have seen it all.  They can look out into an endless patch of land that probably looks no different than it did a hundred years ago and speak of how it is all changing, how time feels faster, how the world is closing in on them making them feel squeezed when there used to be wide open empty spaces.  They’re not really talking about the land, but the person standing there observing how life has changed, how in their youth everything felt possible, they could feel wild and carefree, but nowadays by the time you’re out of high school, your future is set.  There won’t be any other possibilities, and it’s going to be that way for the rest of your life, where only death will change the inevitable.    

Anarene (filmed on location in Wichita Falls and Archer City, Texas) is a small, dusty town of a little over a thousand with a diner and a pool hall that never seem to close, and a single run down movie theater that plays old classic movies where an old woman, the lone employee, struggles to make popcorn.  A clue as to why they’re in this predicament on the verge of closing down is they don’t charge much more than a quarter.  This is an era where radio is still king, where Bob Wills and Hank Williams reign supreme, the late 40’s and early 50’s, before most of the residents in town even own a television set.  Boys work in the oil business or join the army after high school, while girls get married.  That’s just the way it was then.  Somehow, it felt simpler and less complicated, but people faced the same problems then as they do today.  Timothy Bottoms plays Sonny Crawford, a sweet kid with a kind heart, while his best friend Duane (Jeff Bridges) is an oil roughneck with slick, greasy hair and a volatile temper.  Like some kind of Peyton Place soap opera, Duane is going with the richest, prettiest girl in town, Jacy, Cybill Shepherd in her film debut, who is spot on as the spoiled brat with a charming smile who is used to getting whatever she wants by going into her helpless routine, a sex tease who can change the way a man thinks with the batting of an eye.  After a worn out relationship with a girl dies of disinterest, Sonny hasn’t really got anyone except Duane.  Ellen Burstyn as Jacy’s mother is one of the best things in this film, as she married the richest man for miles and is miserable, but she knows Duane is not the right kind of guy for Jacy, which is the only reason she’s with him in the first place.  Clu Gulager plays Abilene, a pool shark who works for Jacy’s father, a man with a love for money and women and is usually mixed up with one or the other.  Ben Johnson from the old John Ford westerns plays Sam, the grizzled old owner of most of the town’s establishments who has the decency to employ Billy (Sam Bottoms, Timothy’s real brother), a mentally challenged young boy who spends his futile time sweeping the dust from the sidewalks and the streets.  Sonny is the only other kid in town who takes a liking to Billy, who worships him because of it.  Eileen Brennan runs the diner with an iron fist, but is a soft touch with a no nonsense veneer, while Cloris Leachman as Ruth Popper is a revelation in this film, playing the eternally sad wife of a high school coach who is rejuvenated when she has a secret affair with Sonny that the entire town somehow knows about.  Every one of these performances is something to rave about, all remarkably contribute to the overall tone of authenticity, as these characters feel lived in like a comfortable pair of old shoes.  Somehow it all works. 

This film is as much about the teenage kids as it is about their all but absent or missing parents, whose empty lives they are about to fill, which is a sad truth about isolated small towns where money remains in the hands of a privileged few and everyone else suffers.  Jacy plays just about every guy in town, each move more calculated and self-centered than the next, but she gets away with it, making everyone else around her miserable.  There are a couple brilliant scenes in this film, the town Christmas party with all of its ramifications, Sonny kisses Ruth for the first time as he’s helping her take out the garbage and Jacy leaves Duane for a rich kids naked pool party where first time initiates must strip naked on the diving board while everybody watches, which Sybill deftly handles, both the first and second times Jacy and Duane have sex in a motel room, both of which are comical, where he’s still talking about it to her as they’re singing the state song of Texas at their graduation ceremony, Sam’s personal confessions to Sonny out at the lake, one of the turning points of the film which won him an Academy Award, or my favorite, when Sonny’s crazy enough to fall for Jacy’s scheme to get married, alerting her parents so they barely get past the state line, only to lose her forever when her father snatches her away for good and Sonny has to ride back to town with Jacy’s sympathetic mother and a flask of bourbon, where for one brief moment in time the balance of adulthood and childhood are perfectly in tune with one another, and finally Sonny’s visit to Ruth at the end which resonates with a kind of fury that’s been missing in this film, where someone has hell to pay, but which turns on a dime and becomes one of the more eloquent transformations of damaged souls crying out in muted pain.  This film is brilliantly written, so much of it understated, perfectly capturing that moment in time when a child is no longer a child anymore, where they have become who they are without even realizing it, still clueless perhaps about themselves and their future, but they are the living embodiment of heartbreak as time has literally begun to pass them by.