A nasty little must have. This Orson Welles crime drama marks both a high point and kiss off of the noir genre and the misunderstood master's last American film. Shot in ’58 and unceremoniously dumped at theaters as the bottom half of a double bill, TOUCH OF EVIL was touched by genius even though the studio took the film away from Welles, shot some new scenes and mucked up the sound edit.Two years ago all that was made right by Oscar winning sound designer Walter Murch, who worked from Welles 58-page complaint memo to the studio. The result is an aural and visual revelation.
Set in two border towns between the U.S. and Mexico (actually shot in Venice California), TOUCH is the sleazy story of crooked cops (Welles), kidnapped wives (Janet Leigh) and honorable men (Charlton Heston). Through mean baroque lit streets and shadowy alleys both countries low lives dance a song of sex, drugs and death. Welles’ trademark deep focus b/w photography hit an apex here starting with the celebrated three and one half minute opening shot.
As Hank Quinlan, the obese cop who’s gone to seed (both ethically and physically), Welles has a ball slurring, spitting and slandering everyone around him (not so surprisingly it’s the part that steals the movie). Heston plays the straight arrow Mexican narcotics officer who is saddled with both all the straight lines and some muddy make up that never makes us believe he’s a south of the border kind of guy for one moment. Janet Leigh gets the most out of her damsel in distress role, (she plays Heston’s skittery new bride), as she’s manipulated, kidnapped and finally trapped in a small motel where a madman is peeping her (sound similar to a Hitchcock film in the early ‘60s? It’s just another layer of fun in this multi-textured treasure.)
Since this revised gem’s pristine print has been lovingly transferred to DVD (where you can really appreciate the sound montage Welles had in mind), one would assume there is also revealing documentaries and scholarly commentaries, a litany of other goodies.
Not so. Universal wouldn’t release the one hour documentary on the restoring of the film and there’s no audio accompaniment (even the recent release of Welles’ LADY FROM SHANGHAI had a hilariously dead pan Peter Bogdanovich reading from one of his books), only the trailer, Welles entire memo and a pitch to buy other Universal DVDs.Are we sad? Naw. Those goodies get tiresome after one pass, the film stands alone, and plays well in segments or in its entirety. And here’s a novel suggestion. A perfect accompaniment to the film would be THIS IS ORSON WELLES by Orson Welles and Peter Bogdanovich, 530 pages of juicy interviews and loving analysis. So get the book, buy the DVD and crank it up. Flaws and all it’s even more fun to dissect than CITIZEN KANE.-- Paul Zimmerman
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