Although totally absurd from beginning to end, making no sense at all and lacking all logic and meaning, it is a great film and one of Orson Welles' greatest. What makes this film then so enchanting and endearing in its utter horror? It's not just the music, one of the most beautiful pieces ever made, unfathomably sad like a dirge without end, but also the brilliant camera work and the fantastic settings - most of the film was apparently shot in an abandoned factory, and there are some labyrinths in it. At the same time the film is impressingly prophetic - it could have been today, it is very far from the 60s, but as it transcended that age it also transcends today. In its abstract world of unreality, this film more clearly than most hits the dimension of timelessness.
Orson Welles himself plays rhe advocate Hastler, pronounced the same way as hustler, Jeanne Moreau is the lewd neighbour of Antony Perkins, 'Josef K.', the man on trial settling with a case of hopelesslness imposed on him by an alien world he can't accept, Romy Schneider plays another lovesick mistress of the advocate and others, Elsa Martinelli is another beautiful girl, and there are crowds of extras, especially at court, where they become alive.
The not least interesting detail about the film is the fact that the music, Tommaso Albinoni's 'Adagio', has a story that fits the film. It's not at all certain that it is by Albinoni. The music turned up in Dresden after the firestorm of February 13th 1945 on a sheet of music that was saved, and someone made a proper arrangement of it. The sheet is supposed to have carried the information that it was a theme by Albinoni, but even that is uncertain. Combine the holocaust of Dresden with the mood of this film, and you'll acknowledge that Orson Welles couldn't have made a more fitting choice.
Orson Welles himself plays rhe advocate Hastler, pronounced the same way as hustler, Jeanne Moreau is the lewd neighbour of Antony Perkins, 'Josef K.', the man on trial settling with a case of hopelesslness imposed on him by an alien world he can't accept, Romy Schneider plays another lovesick mistress of the advocate and others, Elsa Martinelli is another beautiful girl, and there are crowds of extras, especially at court, where they become alive.
The not least interesting detail about the film is the fact that the music, Tommaso Albinoni's 'Adagio', has a story that fits the film. It's not at all certain that it is by Albinoni. The music turned up in Dresden after the firestorm of February 13th 1945 on a sheet of music that was saved, and someone made a proper arrangement of it. The sheet is supposed to have carried the information that it was a theme by Albinoni, but even that is uncertain. Combine the holocaust of Dresden with the mood of this film, and you'll acknowledge that Orson Welles couldn't have made a more fitting choice.