**Spoiler Alert**
Director: Carol Reed/Starring: Joseph Cotten, Orson Welles, Alida Valli and Trevor Howard
Carol Reed's masterwork
The Third Man returns to the big screen for a summer sojourn in select theaters; fully restored and ever stunning to behold. Time hasn't marred its beauty nor dulled its sharp edges. Reed's superlative camera work, Robert Krasker's gorgeous cinematography and Anton Karas' score, which is fascinatingly idiosyncratic and just plain odd are also intact and have been preserved for posterity. But the cast is no less exceptional and are as memorable as the myriad images that are forever scorched in my mind. But of course an assemblage of talent would be only that if not for Graham Greene's exquisite screenplay, which is as extraordinary (in my opinion) as any of his novels.
The re-release of
The Third Man, in the middle of the summer corporation-cinema season, seems wildly incongruous but thank goodness it has arrived. Nothing I've seen this summer at the multiplex (and little at the art-houses) is fit to share screen-time with Reed's film, but then again, little else could.
It seems needless to synopsize the film, since the story is familiar to cinephiles and more casual movie-goers so I'll try to be concise.
The story takes place immediately after the close of World War II. As Europe is being temporarily zoned by the allies, the city of Vienna is also subject to post-war balkanization. Rubble-strewn streets are hardly uncommon, as is the brisk black market, where much contraband changes hands undetected.
Into this milieu comes American pulp-western novelist Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten); broke and in need of work promised to him by an enterprising friend of his in Vienna; one Harry Lime. After Martins arrives, he learns his friend has been killed in a traffic accident though accounts of the tragedy disturbingly contradict one another. An officer for the British sector, Major Calloway (Trevor Howard), bears some disturbing news about Lime, of which Martins is unprepared to hear. Though Martins is saddened by his friend's death, Calloway is hardly so. He explains to Martins that Lime was a black marketeer; wanted by all the allied governing bodies for selling diluted penicillin.
Martins, naive and unconvinced that his friend could be capable of what Calloway accuses him of, conducts his own investigation into the "accident." Learning of a mysterious
third man who was present at the time of Lime's death, Martins pursues his investigation, much to the impatience and annoyance of Calloway, who would like nothing more than to see the American writer on a plane home.
Martins meets someone else affected by Lime's death; an actress named Anna Schmidt (Alida Valli); an erstwhile lover of the black marketeer, who remains haunted by his death. As Martins uncovers and discovers more about his friend, he falls in love with Anna, though her indifference hardly dissuades him.
As Martins frays every last nerve of Calloway's, a fortuitous encounter during a dark, Viennese evening reveals Lime's presence in a doorway as it suddenly becomes bathed in light. Lime's impish grin is a prelude to his flight from Martins, who desperately chases his friend through the moody and shadowy streets. Lime manages to elude his friend; virtually disappearing into thin air.
When Calloway and the authorities learn that Lime is still alive, a manhunt commences through Viennese sewers--an impressive sequence in the film.
The 1940s' more or less began with
Casablanca; an iconic film set just before World War II and ended with
The Third Man; a film about the war's aftermath that is every bit as powerful (though not as highly esteemed in the public's estimation) as Michael Curtiz's film. I'll always prefer Reed's film to Casblanca's more romanticized nature. Curtiz's film ultimately ends in self-less heroism, while Reed's ends with the death of character who was anything but a war hero. Blaine and Lime could be the same character in parallel universes, who view the war differently. For one it is something unpleasant but inevitable and something to be won by self-sacrifice while the other sees war and conflict as indispensable catalysts for progress and achievement--and something to be exploited.
Reed's film is chock full of quirks. The zither music that dominates the score will forever be a bone of contention among film score enthusiasts. What would possess a director to commission such highly eccentric music for a film that seems to demand a darker score with orchestral arrangements? In spite of Reed's unorthodox approach, I've always felt the score worked.
There are very few shots in the film that aren't cockeyed. In most every shot, the floor seems to be tilted, as if the occupants and furniture might slide off the screen. Many of said compositions are also shot from the perspective of the floor. The effect creates a sense of imbalance; as if the war robbed the world of its sense of order. And of course there is Lime himself. Everything we need to know about Lime and his cynical opportunism is summarized in the now famous Coo-Coo Clock speech, which was conceived and written by Welles himself. What is slightly disturbing about said speech is that it actually makes sense and may contain more truths about humanity and the world than we--or Martins--may care to admit.
And then there are the performances, which make the movie hum. Cotten is terrific as the wet-behind-the-ears Martin with his child-like innocence, which is slowly eroded by the world's harsh realities. Alida Valli, in the finest role of her career, is perfect in the role of Anna Schmidt. Her dark, lovely features are often disturbed by melancholy, longing and loss. Trevor Howard is quite excellent as Major Calloway, who serves as the film's heavy early on. Calloway has seen his share of brutality and death yet retains some semblance of humanity in his pursuit of Lime, who he is quite right to hate. Welles' Harry Lime is one of the most fascinating criminals in film history. Lime inhabits a moral world of his own design that he justifies with the coldest logic. Where did he go wrong? How did he become such an unconscionable scoundrel? In spite of his crimes, why is it impossible to loathe him? Is his death and not his crimes the real tragedy in the film?
In the end, Martins' joins the hunt for Lime, an act Anna feels is an unforgivable betrayal, in spite of what she knows about her former lover. She remains fiercely loyal to Lime and brooks no compromise on the subject.
The film ends where it began: at Lime's funeral, which suggests the villain's fate was inescapable. Very few film endings are as bleak as Reed's final shot. There is no happy ending for any of the characters; even Calloway, who derives no pleasure or sense of victory from the tragedy. There is much loss and disappointment to go around and it does. In the final scene, as Anna approaches the screen from the distance, she is flanked by trees that have been severely pruned. The sight of nearly branchless, leafless trees lends something to the moribund atmosphere and serves as appropriate metaphor for all the death and despair the war visited on the world.
Much more could be said of Reed's masterpiece. I can't imagine the subject could be exhausted.
I think the film's restoration was a moral and artistic imperative. I'm very grateful that it returned to the screen. I hope every avid film-goer has a chance to see it in a theater and savor its greatness, which remains blissfully undiminished.
