Bye Mancini, Hello Mariachi

Now providing the masses with everything from movies, music and television shows to theme parks and tacky gifts, Universal Studios has indicated a return to its film production roots with the re-release of Orson Welles' Touch of Evil. Perfectly timed to debut at the Silver Anniversary of the Telluride Film Festival--incidentally a festival founded by a film archivist--the restoration effort presumably targets our recent resurgence of interest in Americana by restoring a figure, much maligned in his time, to his much deserved position of authority.

After seeing the original cut only once, Orson Welles wrote a 58-page "memo" to Universal Studios head Edward Muhl detailing the mauling the studio had done to his film. Buried for 40years, the "newly-discovered" memo provided the basis for the restoration effort, now the fourth incarnation of the film. Originally 95 minutes, Touch of Evil now runs for 111 minutes, three more than the previous version. In addition to eliminating several scenes added by the studio, the current version restores originally cut footage and re-edits several scenes for a total of about 50 changes in the film.

A bit of a box-office bomb at the time of its release, Touch of Evil has nevertheless been heralded as one of the masterpieces of the noir genre. Charlton Heston plays Ramon Miguel "Mike" Vargas, a Mexican narcotics investigator embroiled in a shady murder investigation just on the other side of the border. Heading the investigation is Captain Hank Quinlan, played by a padded and bloated Welles. When Quinlan's abuse of power proves too great an affront to Vargas' moral sensibilities, he soon involves both himself and his newlywed American wife, played by a feisty Janet Leigh, in the cutthroat bordertown brawl between good and evil. Billed as "The strangest vengeance ever planned!" Touch of Evil also provides some fairly strange casting (yes, even beyond the choice of Heston as Mexican). Among the cameos dotting the border landscape are Marlene Dietrich as a gypsy, Zsa Zsa Gabor as a madam, and Mercedes McCambridge as a lesbian gang leader.

The twisted and twisting plot, already enough to leave you feeling as if you've been accosted by a sewer, becomes even more visceral when viewed through Welles' innovative techniques. In fact, the most noticeable (and necessary) change made in the restored version is the elimination of the credits and the overlaid soundtrack from the famous opening shot. The brilliant oscillation between the simple continuity of a single shot and the complexity of the choreography creates a sense of tension now unburdened by surface distractions. Without the studio veneer, the probing camera and the cacophonic textures of street noise achieve a phenomenal depth that truly captures the oddly discontinuous sensation of shifting through space.

And somehow Touch of Evil offers even more after those historic first three min- utes. Welles capitalizes on the B-movie budgetand fuses his technical limitations with thestory, creating a cohesive alienation. Combiningthe distortion of an 18.5 mm lens, the dizzyingdiscomfort of handheld cameras, the high contrastimages of low lighting, and the frighteninglyenormous figures produced by low angle shots, thefilm replaces surface normality with theunsettling.

The film's steady injection of 1958's versionof deviant sex, drug use and rock and roll furtherprovokes the dirty feelings of disgust. Thesethreats to the blissful uniformity of Americanpost-war culture, being perhaps more immediate tothe general audience, elicit the gut response thatthen highlights the more latent tension presentedby the fear of foreign infiltration. Welles, asboth actor and director, effectively uses thenational border to comment on the relationship ofindividual security to larger systems. As much aswe, especially as an American audience, would liketo believe in our absolute ability to choose weare often structured by our identification withsome cause or other and let the system choose forus.

The uncanny ability to convey alienation,injustice and disempowerment undoubtedly hassomething to do with Welles own experiencesattempting to work within Hollywood. After aseries of commercial failures, Orson Welles exiledhimself to Europe for 10 years. Having areputation for being difficult and often goingoverbudget, Hollywood was not terribly excitedabout his return to make Touch of Evil. Infact, it wasn't until Charlton Heston realizedthat Welles was only acting in the film and notdirecting it, and consequently refused to work onthe film unless Welles was the director, thatWelles was offered the position. Nevertheless,Welles was fired in post-production and his filmwas butchered.

Forty years later and Citizen Kane hitsthe top of the AFI 100 charts. Universal Studiosheadlines its Universal Noir tour with a restoredversion of the famed director's film, Touch ofEvil, and the accompanying blurb: "'UniversalNoir' is the first of what Universal Studios hopeswill be an on-going series of classic films fromour library, organized by genre or director orstar, which will enable audiences to enjoy atheatrical moviegoing experience the wayfilmmakers intended." There's some hope left. Butbefore we get too excited and lose sight of whythe restoration effort had to occur in the firstplace, just remember what Welles had to say abouthis troubles: I'm not bitter about Hollywood'streatment of me, but over its treatment ofGriffith, von Sternberg, Von Stroheim, BusterKeaton and a hundred others.

The film's steady injection of 1958's versionof deviant sex, drug use and rock and roll furtherprovokes the dirty feelings of disgust. Thesethreats to the blissful uniformity of Americanpost-war culture, being perhaps more immediate tothe general audience, elicit the gut response thatthen highlights the more latent tension presentedby the fear of foreign infiltration. Welles, asboth actor and director, effectively uses thenational border to comment on the relationship ofindividual security to larger systems. As much aswe, especially as an American audience, would liketo believe in our absolute ability to choose weare often structured by our identification withsome cause or other and let the system choose forus.

The uncanny ability to convey alienation,injustice and disempowerment undoubtedly hassomething to do with Welles own experiencesattempting to work within Hollywood. After aseries of commercial failures, Orson Welles exiledhimself to Europe for 10 years. Having areputation for being difficult and often goingoverbudget, Hollywood was not terribly excitedabout his return to make Touch of Evil. Infact, it wasn't until Charlton Heston realizedthat Welles was only acting in the film and notdirecting it, and consequently refused to work onthe film unless Welles was the director, thatWelles was offered the position. Nevertheless,Welles was fired in post-production and his filmwas butchered.

Forty years later and Citizen Kane hitsthe top of the AFI 100 charts. Universal Studiosheadlines its Universal Noir tour with a restoredversion of the famed director's film, Touch ofEvil, and the accompanying blurb: "'UniversalNoir' is the first of what Universal Studios hopeswill be an on-going series of classic films fromour library, organized by genre or director orstar, which will enable audiences to enjoy atheatrical moviegoing experience the wayfilmmakers intended." There's some hope left. Butbefore we get too excited and lose sight of whythe restoration effort had to occur in the firstplace, just remember what Welles had to say abouthis troubles: I'm not bitter about Hollywood'streatment of me, but over its treatment ofGriffith, von Sternberg, Von Stroheim, BusterKeaton and a hundred others.