Orson Welles: The One-Man Band

Oja Kodar collaborates with Slovenian documentarian Vassili Silovic on a documentary about Orson Welles' unfinished work. On the one hand, it's fascinating to see footage from his unfinished work, but it's also a bit on the dry side ... mainly lacking the presence of Welles himself.

A must for Orson Welles fans--a good way to see bits of many of his unfinished projects in one place.

It's interesting watching this 26 years after it was released as some of the 'rare' footage has since found its way to YouTube and in the case of 'The Other Side of The Wind' the film has been completed and formally released. But there is still much here that is indeed special and worth watching, in particular for Wellesphiles, and this has much to do with Oja Kodar. I walked away from this film liking Oja even more than before; I wish more of her work with Welles was completed.

Of interest for the clips, some of which do have almost a home movie feel about them, but not too much light is shed.

Welles' unfinished films, from what's seen here, definitely are on the snooty and archaic side; some seem outright frivolous. Still, spending his days futzing to his heart's content with personal projects must have been as fulfilling as having them felled by bad luck or breached trust was painful.

A doc I can keep coming back to - seeing all this unreleased Welles work (even the comedic bits) is such a treat. The ultimate special edition material.

Informative and less dry than you might expect, because of the nature of the material being dealt with. It features a lot of previously unseen footage of abandoned and incomplete Welles projects, and offers a lot of insight into the latter half of his career. Orson Welles was probably the most talented person to ever pick up a camera, and the fact that he was only able to finish twelve movies (less than half of those reflecting fully his vision) is a crime.