The 60th anniversary 4K restoration of Orson Welles’ film adaptation of The Trial, starring Anthony Perkins, Jeanne Moreau, Romy Schneider and Welles himself, will be shown in the U.S. for the first time at Film Forum in New York City later this year, followed by a national roll-out.
The movie, distributed by Rialto Pictures, will open there on December 9 and run two weeks through December 22, according to Bruce Goldstein, repertory artistic director at the Film Forum.
Additional U.S. dates are planned, according to Rialto Pictures.
The restored The Trial had its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May.
The restoration from the original 35mm negative was presented by StudioCanal and the Cinémathèque française. The 4K image and sound restoration work was completed at the Immagine Ritrovata Laboratory (Paris-Bologne). The French fashion house Chanel underwrote the cost of the restoration.
Called “the gold standard of reissue distributors” by the Los Angeles Times, Rialto Pictures was founded in 1997 by programmer and publicist Bruce Goldstein, when he realized that so many classic films had no distribution in the U.S. He was joined a year later by partner Adrienne Halpern. Since its founding, Rialto has reissued over 100 films in new 35mm prints or digital restorations, with fresh new marketing (trailers, posters, etc.) and, in the case of foreign language films, brand new translations and subtitles. Rialto is also the U.S. distributor of Carol Reed’s The Third Man, starring Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles as Harry Lime, which the company has released in 35mm and 4K restorations.
The Museum of Modern Art in New York will commemorate Rialto’s 25th anniversary next year with a retrospective, “Rialto Pictures: 25 for 25.”
The Film Forum has championed independent and classic films for more than 50 years. Programming and ticket information can be found at filmforum.org
Upon its release in December 1962, Welles boasted “The Trial is the best film I have ever made.”
Based on the Franz Kafka novel of the same name, The Trial stars Anthony Perkins as Josef K., a bureaucrat who is accused of a never-specified crime. In addition to directing, Welles wrote the screenplay and co-starred in the movie.
Producer Alexander Salkind secured backing of French, German and Italian investors some 60 years ago.
Welles began the production in Yugoslavia with scenes also shot in Rome, Milan and, most notably, the Gare d’Orsay, an abandoned Parisian railway station.
The film has been described as polarizing with critics divided over it upon its release. However, it now holds an 84 percent critical rating and 87 percent audience approval rating at the aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes.
Nearly 20 years after its release, Welles planned to create a documentary on the making of The Trial, similar to his Filming Othello. Cinematographer Gary Graver filmed Welles addressing a University of Southern California audience on the film’s history in 1981. However, Welles never completed the proposed documentary. It can be found on YouTube or in the Gold Ninja Blu-ray The Other Side of Gary Graver.
The Trial‘s copyright was never filed and the film has been available on a number of low quality videotapes and DVDs. However, that changed with a restoration in 2000 by Milestone Films and a high definition release by StudioCanal 12 years later.
StudioCanal will release The Trial on a 4K UHD disc in Europe in September.
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