MERCHANT OF VENICE

[nickleschichoney]

I hope all these items eventually become available on DVD.

Well, AFAIK, Oja Kodar's main focus has been getting TOSOTW released more than any other Welles project. After this is done, The Merchant of Venice, The Deep, and even Don Quixote might be next.

[Wich2]

I look forward to seeing this, as the MERCHANT material in the package I saw at Film Forum a few years back was very interesting.

...well, hopefully it was good, too...

Within the constraints of what it was, and judging as well as can be from its unfinished nature, yes.

-Craig

[Roger Ryan]

Here's an Italian feature story on the screening of the reconstructed Merchant of Venice at the Venice Film Festival in 2015...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RM1VDenkfY8
...which includes actual footage of the screening. Also, an orchestra is shown performing some of composer Francesco Lavagnino's score live...and there's even footage of the European cut of Othello dubbed in Italian.

[Le Chiffre]

Thanks for the link, Roger. That must have been quite an event to see it with live orchestra.

That's the second time I've seen footage of Welles's Merchant where someone asks Shylock for money on the street. This time it looked like some kind of prank by several people. I don't what the significance of that may be, but it's interesting.

[Joe G]

I would love to see the restored version of The Merchant of Venice. I saw a few clips on YouTube and I thought it looked amazing. The music was excellent too. Hopefully someday they might release it on DVD and Blu Ray.

[maxrael]

I would love to see the restored version of The Merchant of Venice. I saw a few clips on YouTube and I thought it looked amazing. The music was excellent too. Hopefully someday they might release it on DVD and Blu Ray.

Yes! I've been hoping to see The Merchant of Venice for years since the tantalising descriptions on this thread. A Blu Ray set of the unfinished Welles films in their current condition with the heroic restoration work carried out by Stefan Dröessler and his team would be such a wonderful thing for us Welles fans to get our teeth into!
I guess the Munich Film Museum don't manufacture and release discs, so it would require a dvd/blu ray production company to liaise with Oja/Sasha, the museum, the estate of Orson Welles and any other producers or claimants to rights . I had hoped with the successful release of The Other Side of the Wind five years ago, that other unfinished projects might get the greenlight to be released. We wait and we wonder. To be honest after repeated disappointments I was starting to think I'd never see TOSOTW, so if it was possible for that to come out, there is still hope for more!

[Joe G]

Hi maxrael,
I agree with you Stefan Droessler and his team have done great work down the years. Hopefully someday we will get to see more of it.
All the best,
Bye

[Joe G]

The footage I have seen from The Merchant of Venice looks stunning. It reminded me of the Stanley Kubrick movie Eyes Wide Shut. I was just thinking maybe Kubrick saw the 1995 documentary The One Man Band and was inspired by it. I read somewhere that Kubrick was an admirer of Orson Welles work as a director. He said one time that Citizen Kane was one of his favourite films.

[Wellesnet]

THE MERCHANT OF VENICE (RUSHES) by Orson Welles can be viewed on HENRI, the French Cinémathèque's free VOD platform!

The Merchant of Venice (Rushes of the "Hath not a Jew Eyes" speech):
https://www.cinematheque.fr/henri/film/ ... bzZmGDU0dg

La Cinémathèque française
·
Now on HENRI: The Merchant of Venice (Rushes)
Shylock's monologue shot in the early 70s by Orson Welles in connection with the unfinished film "The Merchant of Venice".
The French Cinémathèque preserves many films by Orson Welles, rare copies, some with alternative edits and several sequences from his unfinished films such as Don Quixotte. We owe this precious collection, among other things, to the actress Oja Kodar, her last companion, who generously entrusted the institution with a part of her film archives.
In this extraordinary background, you can find a curious 16mm reel related to the movie "The Merchant of Venice", a piece by piece of the same and long shot: Orson Welles facing the camera, in the skin of the Venetian user Shylock. He recites in strangely different poses the famous tirade of Shakespeare's play, with such a peculiar tone, addressing punctually the technicians who accompany him at the end of certain shots, from actor to director.

[Alan]

This is great stuff, wonderful to see.

The notes say it's from Cinémathèque own archive, "deposited in its collection by Oja Kodar", and fully restored by them. So nothing to do with The Munich Film Museum?

It would be amazing if this was the start of wider access to the archive. Cinémathèque's or The Munich Film Museum!

[tonyw]

As mentioned before, this online access is important especially as some of us may have passport difficulties returning to the USA under new legislation let alone swift arbitrary changes affecting travel to Europe via UK stopovers.

[cinescot]

This is great stuff, wonderful to see.

The notes say it's from Cinémathèque own archive, "deposited in its collection by Oja Kodar", and fully restored by them. So nothing to do with The Munich Film Museum?

It would be amazing if this was the start of wider access to the archive. Cinémathèque's or The Munich Film Museum!

It certainly sounds like some of the films have been moved from Munich to Paris. I'm curious to know what else may have been included in this deal. The fact Cinémathèque Francais have already restored this and made it available online is encouraging as well. Would be great to see more of it made available.