This is the worst movie I've seen in many years.

We cannot judge what the Welles cut would have been as it was butchered by the RKO scissors.


So I hate to rate it as it feels like an unfinished movie. The cinematography by Cortez (most scenes) and some scenes are simply exquisite. So I guess there was a masterpiece in the making. Now it is an excellent movie with masterful scenes.

I agree that crucial information was eliminated, but that doesn't mean if they had left it in the movie would be better, for all we know maybe the excised footage wasn't really good. I'd say that's the reason they cut it in the first place.

I think they probably didn't use it because it sucked. I mean if it made the story better, then they would have used it. Because at this point Welles was still just staring out in films(yea I realize he made a great movie already but still), hadn't quite figured it all out yet. Which is why the studio stepped in and changed some things. Or a lot of things you could say.

"The poor quality of the final two scenes in the released version (both re-shoots after Welles had left) are really out-of-place and I can't imagine they're an improvement over what Welles had shot."

I have to say - I hate the ending of this film, as released, and I also hate the ending of the film Welles had shot, if what is reported to be 'the end' in the Wiki article is to be believed.

Not really talking about cinematography though. My distaste for both concerns the fate of George. All throughout the film he is an obnoxious boor. I had no sympathy for him or his behavior, nor can I suspect that many people can. There is all this talk of him getting his 'comeuppance' - but really, that's not true. Despite 30+ years of downright despicable behavior, in the end, he winds up with the girl he so does not deserve, and on top of that, is saved from financial ruin because Eugene and Lucy are well off. Where is the comeuppance? It was fleeting, barely a few minutes in the film. So he had to swallow his pride and scrape at the factory for a few months at most, then is saved forever. Ugh. Terrible.

On top of that, we are never really shown George realizing his spoiled, controlling, temperamental behavior was an egregious affront to everyone with whom he interacted. He only seems 'broken' by the fact that he lost the house, his family and his fortune. In short, his possessions and his status. That sinks him into despair. Not that he was a total a$$ all of his life.

More aggravating is how/why Lucy would ever be involved with him in the first place. Here is a boy/young man who, from the day she met him, ridiculed and mocked her father, and it only got worse from there. Yet, she sticks with him? Why oh why would she do this? I could not understand that at all, it made absolutely no sense. There was one scene where George's uncle makes a comment about how fighting her father was a strange way to endear himself to her. But yet, it didn't seem to matter. And this makes absolutely no sense to me. You never see Lucy say "you treat my father like dirt, get the heck out of my life." This was beyond frustrating.

In the Wiki article, it has this as a 'deleted scene': 'After Fanny and George move out of the Amberson mansion, George wanders through town and gets his comeuppance. Cinematographer Stanley Cortez filmed a long tracking shot revealing the empty and decaying mansion. Cortez was extremely proud of this shot, but Welles did not use it in his final cut.'

That would have been a perfect ending to the film, right there. Credits role. None of this nonsense with George getting the girl and Eugune and Fanny smiling happily at each other. Or even Welles's version where Eugune leaves Fanny at the boarding house. In that version (from what I read), George and Lucy still wind up together. The only fitting ending is George really getting his comeuppance. At least for me.