Max Allan Collins Novel

[Orson&Jazz]

Wilson, I looked up the novel "Angel In Black" out of curiousity. I came across some thing more interesting though.

I don't know if you had read or heard about it, (I am guessing you have already!) but it is another novel by Max Allan Collins called The War of The Worlds Murder.

Here is a description I found at Amazon.com

Book Description
October, 1938. Orson Welles, known as radio's The Shadow, is accused of killing his mistress on the night of his War of the Worlds broadcast. Only Walter Gibson, The Shadow's creator, knows if Welles is truly guilty.

The novel is to be released on July 5th. It is paperback, so I wasn't sure if the novel was already released prior in hardcover. If it was, have you read it?

[Harvey Chartrand]

Accusing Welles of murder seems to be "in the wind" these days.
Speaking of wind, I just viewed the clips from THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND on THE ONE-MAN BAND documentary. That's a long way down from CITIZEN KANE. The footage is well edited but looks ragged. And what's with the red tint? The car in which the sex scene was shot is still parked in the same spot outside an abandoned house in Paris! So much time has passed that small trees are growing out it.

[Wilson]

I haven't read either Collins book, I just know of them. I would imagine the WIND footage looks rough because the negative is not being used? Isn't it locked away because of the whole legal dispute?

[Roger Ryan]

Unfortunately, the red tint is a common problem with color film stock from the 70s. I don't recall the exact reason right now, but film stock from that period has not aged nearly as well as even Technicolor prints from the 30s or 40s. Even the theatrical reissue of "Stars Wars" in '97 suffered a bit from pinkish hues (these were corrected for the recent DVD issue).

[jaime marzol]

i didn't feel like harvey when i saw the clips from OSOTW. i was blown away. i think his genius was at it's peak. he was peaking in the 70s.

to me, touch of evil is more advance than kane. chimes is more advanced than touch of evil, and OSOTW clips are the most brilliant work i've seen from him. would have been incredible to have him around for another 15 years while he was peaking artistically. i didn't have any problem with the condition of the film. being a welles fan makes you tough, you can see through any technical problem.

[etimh]

Re: red tint in The Other Side of the Wind. This is caused by prints that were made using Eastman Color Print Film. Eastman color was introduced, I believe, in 1949 as a negative system to compete with three-strip Technicolor. However, up through the late 1960s, most prints were still made using the Technicolor "imbibition" process. This is essentially a mechanical process whereby pigment is transferred to the print resulting in fantastic color stability. But then Eastman introduced their color print film, a primarily chemical process, and this is where the problems started. The instability of Eastman Color prints was quickly noted by film preservationists and after only about five years Eastman prints begin to exibit severe cyan dye loss and have a pronounced red or magenta hue. A Technicolor imbibition print will appear as perfect in color fidelity as the day it was printed. Often times, while the release prints of films were made using the Technicolor process, many theater trailers were made with the cheaper Eastman Color process. These trailers have deteriorated to a muddy red while the film, luckily, is still stable. One other note, some directors in the 1970s had enough foresight to realize the problems that Eastman Color prints were facing. They made three preservation prints of their films in black and white--which remains stable virtually forever--highlighting each of the three colors, cyan, magenta, and blue. So while all of the Eastman Color prints may deteriorate and fade, and the Eastman negative may even be lost to time, these three black and white preservation prints can be used to make new pristine color prints. Cool huh? Unfortunately, Mr. Welles did not have either the knowledge or the foresight to anticipate the degradation that would eventually effect The Other Side of the Wind. Too bad, but I'm sure it can be color corrected in the computer. Tim

[R Kadin]

Always within reason and, one hopes, the bounds of good taste, but projects that serve to bring Our Man once more to the forefront of public consciousness - thereby promoting "Orson Welles" as a modern and saleable subject - could have certain positive spinoff benefits.

What with the upcoming Spielberg/Cruise "War of the Worlds" movie, "Orson's Shadow" treading the boards, the recent TCM festival, Criterion's North American release of its gloriously restored "F for Fake" on DVD, Clinton Heylin's "Despite the System", this book (which, by your plot synopsis, O&J, appears to accord him a certain edginess - which is a good thing, by modern PR standards) and ubiquitous rounds of Welles retrospectives all over the globe I can hardly recall a period as jam-packed with his presence as this!

While the enthusiast in me would like to think that all this could only mean fantastic things for TOSOTW's completion prospects, the pragmatist in me is reminded that, where Our Obedient Servant is concerned, fate can sometimes play some very bittersweet tricks, indeed.

Please somebody - anybody - feel free to chime in and indulge the fantasy...

[etimh]

R Kadin:

Well, isn't it just a question of those that own the rights getting their butts in gear to get the project going? Considering the relatively broad cineliteracy of the general public, not to mention the institutional enshrinement of the man, I don't think that there is any doubt these days that any project/product associated with Welles can be lucrative if handled correctly.

And I suppose that's the rub--the "correct" handling of the project. So who does own the rights to TOSOTW? What do you imagine are the barriers to get the film restored and released?

Tim

[Orson&Jazz]

As to the release date of this book; July 5th?

Just 7 days after the release of the War of The Worlds movie. Great timing.

I am sure the author is hoping that WOTW fever will catch and help promote book sales.


Welles looks to be indeed a "hot" and saleable item.

[R Kadin]

etimh: As witnessed in various threads on this and other sites, there are as many opinions on the completion hurdles faced by TOSOTW as there are sources to voice them: ownership issues, artistic control issues, money issues, cinematic techniques that have lost their innovative edge, lingering prejudices, distribution concerns, etc. About the only culprit I haven't seen named yet is the ghost of William Randolph Hearst; but let's not rule him out, either.

One that I have speculated about in the past is the possibility that, for virtually no additional investment, a "good enough" living can already be made by some from holding forth on an enticingly unfinished film and its tantalizing clips. Why mess with that formula, especially if it's going to cost millions to do so and leave you answerable for a finite product that's almost certain to alienate at least some of its target audience (and potential lecture attendees) along with their idealized hopes? However, I have been assured by several here, a number of whom have had the privilege of meeting those involved, that the key people in question are effectively immune to such misgivings and that they likely have far more to gain by seeing the project through. I respectfully defer, therefore, to their more informed and more optimistic outlooks.

Nevertheless, the above does play on my mind from time to time as yet another of the possible de-motivators with which a serious completion project might have to contend, the kind that an especially alluring set of commercial prospects would certainly help de-fuse. So, to the extent that all the Welles-related events and enthusiasm we see about us nowadays might be bolstering those prospects, I can only cheer them on all the more.

As to who might own the rights, last I read it could still be a bit of a hornet's nest. Welles himself was rather fond of citing the family of the brother-in-law of the late Shah of Iran as one interested party, perhaps as much for the colour it added to the tale as anything else. Others have suggested that Welles might have pulled a Max Bialystock (a la Mel Brooks' "The Producers") and sold well more than 100% of the film to a disjointed bunch of financial backers thereby throwing the whole rights ownership issue as wide open as it could possibly be.

Apparently more recent comments coming from the Kodar/Graver/Bogdanovich camps suggest that these and other potential claims have been largely sorted out and all that's needed now is enough cash. I'd like to hope it's really all that simple.

[etimh]

R Kadin: thanks for taking the time to drop those insights and commentary. Good information. Cheers, Tim