DB7

BY LAURA MILLER

I first saw Carol Reed's "The Third Man" on late-night television, during one of the spates of classic film watching with which I whiled away my early teens. It struck me as startlingly real, defying both the dreamy, confected world of the rest of the '30s and '40's movies I'd been devouring and the sullen, rebellious romanticism film had inherited from the '60s. It seemed like the creation of a sensibility terribly old and wise, and most of all very European; it was the very essence of world-weary sophistication. In it, Holly Martins, an American author of pulp westerns -- played by Joseph Cotten, tall, brash and handsome -- arrives in post-World War II Vienna expecting to meet an old buddy, Harry Lime. Lime, it turns out, has just been killed in an automobile accident, and Martins decides there's something fishy about the situation, something that only a bright, irreverent Yankee has the wherewithal to uncover.

Based on Graham Greene's novel, with a screenplay also written by Greene, "The Third Man" boasts his trademark of moral confusion coupled with a devious plot. Reed gives the movie a weird, exhausted, paranoid atmosphere in which the rest of the characters observe Holly's "investigation" with the impassive tolerance of adults humoring a deluded child. The skewed frames; the gnomish middle-aged Viennese with their myriad secrets, tiny dogs and fussy clothes; the inky, cobblestone streets and the interiors -- whether battered or ornate, they're always strangely hollow -- combine to make a menacing, alien environment where Holly is immediately, and obliviously, over his head.

As Harry, Orson Welles shows how easily Holly's energy and initiative could curdle into evil if only he were a bit smarter, too smart in fact, for anyone's good. Harry's satanic charm -- he gets the movie's best speech, a jaunty bit about the art of the Medicis vs. the Swiss and their cuckoo clocks -- gives the movie just enough additional gas to power it through its famous sewer chase with that gorgeous, indelible shot of Harry's fingers reaching through the grate.

Holly may be the protagonist of "The Third Man" (such a movie could never have a "hero," or for that matter even an "antihero"), but (Alida) Valli, as Anna, Harry's grieving lover, is its soul. Playing a principled woman who learns that the man she loved was entirely bad, and that even this doesn't matter in the end, Valli has a dignity seldom afforded to women in movies -- her inner life surpasses those of the men around her. If the bruised-little-boy heart of noir finally grew up, it might wear a face as beautiful and sad as hers. The sewer chase may be the most famous sequence in "The Third Man," but I've always remembered her cool, solitary walk down the long graveyard road at the movie's end, her deliberate indifference to Holly's offer of comfort. It's the walk of a woman who knows herself, however painful that knowledge, and she stands taller than any cowboy.

Gibbie

This certainly is one of the all time movie greats. Also, I would list this as the first cold war film. Everyone fit perfectly.

JohnB_Toronto

One of the greatest films-noirs of all time. There is a small scene in which Holly Martins is greeted at a door by older man. "Mr Winkel?" he asks and the man contemptuously answers "It's Vinkel!"

Surely it's on everyone's must-see list. A tribute to how widely and well known this film is came on the old Carol Burnett TV comedy show when they performed a complete parody of it in front of a live audience. In the TV sketch Martin Holly knocks on the door: "Mr Vinkel?" and the man angrily answers "It's Winkel!". The audience broke up. Obviously just about everyone in the house had all seen the film or they'd never have got the joke.

locust

Everybody's favourite closing sequence, I guess.

From Russia with Love.

harkin

Pure movie magic - I once found a VHS copy of 'The Third Man' in a bargain bin in Sacramento and was surprised to find a version with some different audio portions. I had always assumed that Trevor Howard did the narration at the beginning of the film (it sounds just like him, though he talks as if he were in the underworld). Well anyways, in this alternate version there was narration that was totally different and nowhere near as good as the other version I had always seen. I still have this 2nd version somewhere.

Steve Crook

That's director Carol Reed doing the introduction in the British version. In the American version it's done by Joseph Cotton. The American version also has up to 11 minutes sliced out of it.

Steve

Steve Crook

PaPAS

deckard

Yes,Steve, that'll be right! Any idea why 11 minutes of one of the greatest British films of all time was cut for the American market?

"and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock"

dylan

The American version was re-edited to make Martins an hero rather than a naive fool. Dialogue was cut from scenes that made Martin seem like an helpless dupe and possibly an alcoholic.

The semi-naked dancing girl in the night club is missing although she appeared in the American trailer.

Calloway and Lime's visit to the childrens' hospital is edited in such a way as to underplay Lime's evil and Martins' stupidity.

dylan

Opps...that should be Calloway and Marins' visit to the childrens' hospital...

deckard

Doesn't it make it all pointless?One of the main threads of the film was Martins big,daft feet stamping over everything and Lime's cool evil playing with that to gain the advantage,take that away and the film starts to break down into what I suppose the cuts were done for: a let's not get to near reality thing, it might upset the viewing public.(Then we won't make as much money)

"and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock"

dylan

It all stemmed from a dispute between Korda and Selznick who had their own ideas about what the film should be about. Once the two leads became Americans instead of the Englishmen of the original script (Grant and Coward had originally been considered, there was no way Selznick was going to have a silly American as the lead character.

There is in instance where Selznick added something extra to the American version. During the exhumation scene, the coffin lid has a plaque on it reading HARRY LIME just in case American audiences weren't following the plot.

Steve Crook

That sounds like Selznick :)

When he won the right to re-edit Powell & Pressburger's Gone to Earth for an American version, the changes can be split into 3 groups.

1. More scenes showing Jennifer Jones in close-up.
These had to be shot in Hollywood and they seem to have had trouble finding a tame fox. So at the dramatic climax, the American version has a big close-up of Jennifer carrying what is obviously a stuffed toy fox!

2. Cutting out some of the mystery & magic.
The scene where Hazel (Jennifer Jones) is deciding if she should run off with Jack Reddin (David Farrar) she does an old magic spell and when she hears the "fairy music" she decides to go with Reddin.
In the American version they cut the magic spell thus giving her no reason to run off with Reddin (apart from lust).

3. Explaining everything.
It seems that Selznick thought that every little thing had to be explained to an American audience. Lots and lots of extra scenes were added to show a label on something to explain what it was or why it was there.

Steve

Steve Crook

PaPAS

DB7

Behind the screen

During filming of The Third Man, Orson Welles proved to be as elusive as Harry Lime

Legend has it that Graham Greene jotted the outline of the story that would become The Third Man — his tough tale of intrigue in postwar Vienna — on the back of an envelope. Having shared his idea over dinner with the producer Alexander Korda, who was keen on the setting of a war- torn European city, Greene travelled to Vienna with the director Carol Reed.
Greene would work in the morning, while Reed lay in bed. Over lunch, they would discuss what he had written and in the evening they would hit the town. Greene loved strip-clubs, and would later dedicate his personal copy of The Third Man to Reed with the words: “In memory of the many early morning Vienna hours at Maxine’s, the Oriental and the Casanova.”



At a small party, Reed was charmed by Anton Karas’s zither music. Suitably inspired, he turned his hotel room into a studio, stuffing pillows against the doors, and recorded hours of Karas’s playing. Meanwhile, as filming approached, the Hollywood producer David O. Selznick was causing headaches with his interfering memos. But Reed got his way with the casting of Orson Welles in the key role of Harry Lime; Selznick had wanted Noël Coward or Robert Mitchum.

When Welles initially failed to turn up, Reed was forced to shoot many of his scenes using stand-ins and by playing with shadows. With his fee upped to £100,000 for two weeks’ work, Welles arrived. On his first visit to the city’s sewer, the actor went into a tirade about the smell and the possibility of typhoid. “I come from California! I’m so cold!” he grumbled. Stand-ins were used again (it’s Reed’s fingers that are seen poking through the drain cover).

Reed often worked round the clock with the help of Benzedrine, although alcohol played its part, too (Trevor Howard, for his part, was also a regular at the Casanova club). Then, one week from completion, a fire in the cutting room forced Reed to start the edit again from scratch. It was during this time that Reed decided to use zither music all the way through. Karas, the little-known party musician, would have a No 1 record and become richer than he had ever imagined.

deckard

What a strange contradiction "The Third Man" is.....with all the events surrounding the production, it should have been a mess. There was Selnick's initial objections to Welles, probably due to, by then, his(Welles)reputation around Hollywood as being unreliable with production budgets and schedules and his subsequent ejection by RKO. I wonder also how much continuing influence William Hearst had in the demise of relations between Welles and Hollywood? Although Hearst's financial power had dwindled somewhat by the time "Citizen Kane" was released, he was still an extremely powerful man.
Next, we have Welles himself, basically working on this film to make a quick buck to finance his own film projects and fairly excessive lifestyle, not really wanting to be there until tempted by $100,000.
Then, Carol Reed striving to complete the film, overworking himself to the point of needing drugs and alcohol to keep going, no doubt finding Welles considerable personality a strain - as at Shepperton when Welles did some direction over Krasker's shooting, never to be used by Reed in the final edit and subsequently lost for all time.
So, we have Orson Welles "treading water" but producing one of British cinema's most memorable performances, Carol Reed at the Zenith(imho) of his career struggling to stay focussed without chemical help,the serendipituos find of a ordinary cafe zither player Anton Karas, who produced some of the most haunting and instantly recognizable film music and the politcal furore over what the American audiences should see.
In summing-up, I think there is, in the end no substitute for true talent.... Reed, although having a fairly spasmodic later career is one of the finest directors this country has produced, Krasker, a true genius of light and angle behind the camera, Karas, totally inspired at the time, truly wonderful perfomances produced by the rest of the cast and finally Welles, now regarded(arguably) as one of the finest directors of all time and still one of the most talked about. "The Third Man" went on to be hugely successful with spin off TV and radio series, Graham Green's subsequent novel and Karas, probably the most suprised of all with his new found wealth! But so it should have been, although full of contradiction, it is still even to this day a remarkable film, full of atmosphere,style and gripping watchability and as you've probably worked out one of my all-time favourites! :) regards, Decks.

"and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock"

Hackett

I'm always amazed to read about geniuses who battle on through adversity on drugs and alcohol. We have all sat thinking "What was he on when he made that?" watching particular rubbish movies but not classic one's. After one too many I like most people go and sleep it off. Alcohol is a depressant and if you mix it with drugs it don't make no intellectual cocktail. I'm a bit dubious about ARTISTE being creative on drink and drugs. It's all a bit like pop stars making out they were gay in the 70's & 80's or not in the 60's.