Personally,I thought this was Welles' last gasp as a filmmaker..and what a gasp it is!He could have gone more impressionistic and surreal,but he exercised a beautiful restraint-some of the shots in this rival Kubrick easily.For me,the actual composition and direction in this are up there with Kane and Touch Of Evil.Why it dropped into anonymity?Maybe 'cause its too cerebral for most folk-maybe because Welles' reputation as a difficult auteur whom Hollywood refused to tolerate any longer preceded him in such a monstrous,overshadowing way,that public sentiment was something like,"Oh,he's gone all pretentious and artsy on us".It received limited release at the time,but the question remains-why is it not hailed as part of the canon of great films?Well,for me,it is.
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