Rosabella: Orson Welles in Italy

“When he hugged you, it was like a wardrobe embracing a sidetable," says Francesco Lavigno, Italian music composer, of Orson Welles. Clearly, to the brilliant director of Citizen Kane, spending his waning years in a remote villa in Italy, his colleagues were no more than pieces of furniture upon which to hang his grandiose, but never completed, filmic schemes. According to Jeanne Moreau “[Welles] life was littered with lost suitcases, missed planes, unkept appointments and films never finished…” Director Gianfranco Giagni takes it upon himself to find Orson's “lost suitcases” (and rare film clips of projects never completed) as well as to interview the people who loved and hated him as he struggled from 1953 on to make long forgotten movies in the Italian countryside--a period of time as sad as the “downfall” years of Hearst in Kane, and scarily similar. Welles' classic fits of rage are documented, including the infamous dinner with Hemingway where Welles and his Italian girlfriend had a fight and Welles cleared the table of all crystal and cutlery with the sweep of an arm. I was surprised to discover that Welles could never properly write a check, plug in a lamp or fix a car, but could speak fluent Italian. In one sense it is sad to see such a genius of cinema dressing his Roman actors in bedsheets because the studio has confiscated his wardrobe. On the other, from the testimonials involved, one senses Welles paid the price for being the undisputed lord of his films and for wielding his power mercilessly over his fellow artists like so many endtables. Highly recommended. Aud: H, C, P. (R. Ray)