Welles at Cannes 1959

[Tony]

This is a hilarious pseudo-conversation of just a few minutes between Welles, Darryl Zanuck and Juliette Greco at the 1959 Cannes Festival.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=1dXiAiGb5wI&feature=related

[ToddBaesen]

Tony:

What a great find! Notice how Welles naturally directs things, even when doing a newsreel interview. And notice too, the incorrect commentary from the narrator, who when Welles refers to winning the Cannes Prize for OTHELLO in 1952, says it was for THE THIRD MAN!

Also, be sure to watch to the end for a brief clip of Jean Cocteau. I don't think I'd ever seen Cocteau speaking in English before, so that's quite a nice clip to see.

[Store Hadji]

So that means the audience at Cannes booed Welles for his Palme d'Or for Othello? What's up with that? I'd never heard of this before.

[Tony]

I was surprised at that too, Store. Was he kidding?

And Todd: I think he mentions that he was supposed to interview Zanuck.

I only wish it were longer. If you watch the other parts, the documentary is so banal, superficial and relentlessly sexist it's kind of impressive for its purity; for example, check out the interview with Lawrence Harvey while he's smoking a cigar and pretending to play golf! There's almost nothing of content in the whole doc.

Somewhat strange, also ,was the presenting of the award for best actor, won by Dillman, Stockwell and Welles for Compulsion. I recall reading Dillman saying that Welles clearly didn't want the others onstage with him, that Welles was extremely upset he had to share the award. But in this bizarre little doc, it's some American representaive who accepts the award, not the actors.

[Alan Brody]

If you watch the other parts, the documentary is so banal, superficial and relentlessly sexist it's kind of impressive for its purity;

That clip alone makes Cannes look like something out of a Fellini parody. The rich and the bored.

[tonyw]

It is a revelation concerning the type of film industry Welles had to deal with at the time which shunned him then and also posthumously as the wellesnet posting about the leading lights of Hollywood refusing to aid the restoration of TOSW shows.

Welles championed a different type of cinema far removed from what is celebrated in this historical clip not too far removed from today.