If ever there was a man who not only defined the role of auteur director in the United States, but that of a career peaked too early, it’s Orson Welles. I mean, when your debut film is Citizen Kane, one of the most influential and well-regarded works in film history, the power of the sophomore slump becomes all too real. Not to mention being the mastermind behind the infamous War of the Worlds radio broadcast, being friends with H.G. Wells and Ernest Hemingway, and establishing himself as an A-list actor and director in one fell swoop. Which is quite the accomplishment by the way, I can’t think of many examples of great films that starred and were directed by the same person, much less on their debut movie. Aside from Yahoo Serious in the 1988 cult classic Young Einstein of course, but that goes without saying.
At some point point though, whether through his own excesses, a Milius style ostracization from the industry or simply the public moving on, it seems like Welles fell off the face of the earth. By the time of his death in the late 80s, Welles had gone from big budget filmmaking and bullfighting in Spain to doing commercials about frozen peas and ‘playing a giant toy that terrorizes smaller toys’ in 1986’s Transformers: The Movie (a write-up on which can be found on my oft-neglected film blog), which was actually his last film role. A far cry from the Golden Age of Hollywood, and an inglorious end to a contemporary of Billy Wilder and Frank Capra (insert Rust Never Sleeps reference here). So what better way is there to honor the legacy of a great figure in film history than by some jackass watching a movie he was in and writing about it? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
Directed by Carol Reed (Flap, Fallen Idol) and released by 20th Century Fox and British Lion Films in 1949, The Third Man is of the film noir genre, and more generally a thriller/mystery. Film noir was of course the artistic response to the works of German Expressionism (which includes Fritz Lang, who we touched upon last time), and dealt principally with morally bankrupt figures in the dark underbelly of society. Film noir is known today for creating the hardboiled private eye archetype, like Humphrey Bogart’s character in The Maltese Falcon, but both criminals and crime-fighters were common features in the genre. Though not as successful commercially in its heyday, film noir has gone on to become a defining part of pop culture’s perception of the 1940’s and 50’s, and inspired some fantastic films. The aforementioned Maltese Falcon of course, The Big Sleep, Roman Polanski’s Chinatown and Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, and The Third Man. In fact, Craig Johnson of Welcome to the Basement (which has been a huge inspiration to my own film analysis attempts) once labeled The Third Man as the best film of all time, which might have been an incentive to check it out for myself. To see if Flava Flav’s advice was legit or not, you understand.
In post-war occupied Vienna, down-on-his-luck novelist Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) arrives from the United States to stay with his mercurial friend Harry Lime (Orson Welles). Unfortunately for Martins it appears that Harry Lime has passed away, tragically killed in a hit-and-run accident some time prior to Holly’s arrival. Martins is understandably distraught, even more so when the military police (headed by one Major Calaway) make it quite clear that they’d very much prefer that he take the next plane out of here. It seems that Lime was a businessman of the illegal black market variety in Vienna, one famous enough and dirty enough to warrant a major investigation upon his apparent death. It’s pretty common to see folks change after they move to a new place, but you always hope that they don’t get involved in racketeering and other general crimes. You want to talk about the price of gas, they want to talk about beating snitches with baseball bats, the common ground is lost. Damn shame.
Being the good friend that he is, Martins is unwilling to just skip town without finding out the truth over Lime’s ultimate fate, and so he starts his own investigation. Lime’s beautiful yet enigmatic former love interest Ms. Anna Schmitt doesn’t know anything, and Lime’s friends rattle off the same story as Calaway: Lime was struck by a car whose driver had no prior intent to kill him, he was then carried into a nearby building by his where he promptly died from his injuries. Sounds like a cut-and-dry no mysteries twist of fate (#words), until Holly meets with an elderly porter who happened to witness the event in question. According to him, there were in fact three people that carried the injured Harry Lime on that particular day, rather than the two in the official story. Who is this third man? Is Harry Lime really dead, or is there some sort of devious scheme at work here? And if Lime is still alive, how will Holly react knowing that he is a criminal? Plenty of questions to be answered in this mystery movie, amazingly enough, which you’ll have to watch for yourself to find out.
I have to admit that I’m a sucker for film noir, and have been for quite some time. It’s hard to pinpoint the exact reason why; maybe I’m just a sucker for a good mystery, or perhaps a grey world of morally ambiguous failures and badniks appeal to a depressive guy like me, who can say. Film noir much like horror is a genre that can fall into the repetitions of the same trope, the hard-boiled P.I., the femme fatale, etc., but much like with horror (Much like with any movie I suppose, considering how many times the ‘Hero’s Journey’ archetype has been repeated throughout history), it doesn’t really matter if familiar ground is trod upon when the movie itself is good.
Such is the case with The Third Man, which I found to be a fantastic film. Although Welles doesn’t get into the film until about halfway through, and doesn’t really have that much in the way of speaking roles (even though I prefaced this whole thing by hyping up his acting status), his portrayal of Harry Lime is subtly brilliant; charmingly charismatic yet callous and manipulative, the kind of guy you’re not sure whether to like or hate. In fact everyone puts on a magnificent performance here, the perpetually out of the loop Holly Martins, the hard-nosed Major Calaway, the romantic Anna Schmitt, everyone feels vibrant and real to me. Same goes for the location, either Vienna or a city meant to look like it at least, I believe Prague is usually the most common substitution. There’s just something about old world architecture that I love, buildings and streets that have been around since the days when folks used mercury as a beauty cream. It’s familiar and alien at the same time, and it serves as iconic set pieces for the film’s pivotal scenes.
There’s really only one thing I can think of about the film that bothered me enough to affect my experience. Originally it was going to be two, but upon further reflection I’ve decided against it. That singular point would the music, which forgoes the smoky bebop jazz ingrained in pop culture’s vision of film noir in favor of what I assume is Austrian folk music. It’s appropriate to the setting of the film and I probably wouldn’t mind it on a repeat viewing, but it sounded almost cacophonous this time around. Either the mixing was a bit off or I’m just a bit over sensitive to those kinds of things, but I found the score to be grating more often than not.
Aside from that though, I found The Third Man to be a fantastic film, as I mentioned previously. Great characters, great locations, a healthy dose of moral ambiguity and an ending that ties it all up with a bittersweet ribbon (don’t eat ribbons kids). Those interested in exploring film noir would probably benefit by putting this on the top of their watch queue, and those who enjoy a good thriller will find some enjoyment as well. For those looking to get some more Orson Welles under their belts, I’d also suggest his almost-Orwellian take on Franz Kafka’s The Trial, which he directed and acted in. Legendary work from a legendary man.
Result: Recommended
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