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"Touch of Evil" opens with a mind-blowing traveling shot that starts at the level of a belt buckle and then swings left and right and up as a quicksilver figure sets a time bomb and places the device in the trunk of a car. Continuing in one unbroken movement as a blonde and a millionaire get into the car, the camera pulls away into a panoramic view of the border town of Los Robles, Mexico, then floats down to follow Mexican narcotics investigator Vargas ( Charlton Heston) and his Philadelphian wife (Janet Leigh) as they prepare to cross from his country to hers on foot. ("You folks are American citizens?" the border guard asks pointedly.) The Vargases reach the checkpoint just as the millionaire and the blonde in the car do - and the blonde complains, "I've got this ticking noise in my head."
The Vargases kiss. Orson Welles cuts and - kaboom! - he nails down the movie's mood, its setting, its plot and even its racial friction in one audacious piece of virtuoso camera choreography. (The shot clocks in at three minutes and 20 seconds.)
The version of the film that the Charles will present three times in the next seven days, re-edited by Walter Murch in 1998 according to Welles's own editing notes, restores that introduction to its full audiovisual glory.
When Welles signed on with Universal to direct and write as well as act in "Touch of Evil," after nearly a decade abroad, he was fighting for the chance to once again be an American artist working in America. He thoroughly revamped the script, based on Whit Masterson's serviceable policier called "Badge of Evil," making anti-Mexican racism a key issue, telling the story from three different points of view and bringing a tragic dimension to his heavy of heavies - Captain Quinlan, an obsessive police captain with an adoring henchman as well as an instinct for finding culprits and a penchant for framing them. Reversing the racial makeup of two key characters, Welles turned the putative hero (Heston) into Mexican supernarc Vargas and his new wife (Leigh) into a spunky Anglo.
The result was a disreputable classic whose brave sensibility more than matches its towering bravura.
"Touch of Evil" plays at noon Saturday, at 7 p.m. Monday and at 9 p.m. Thursday at the Charles, 1711 N. Charles St. For more information, call 410-727-FILM or go to thecharles.com.
The Senator lives!
Independent film has found a welcome showcase at Baltimore's 900-seat Senator Theatre. At 7:30 p.m. on Saturday it hosts the Baltimore premiere of Giancarlo ("Homicide") Esposito's directorial debut, "Gospel Hill," a drama about a Southern neighborhood ripped apart on racial lines by redevelopment, awakening memories of a black activist assassinated 30 years before. On Monday and Tuesday the Senator presents Curt Worden's "One Fast Move or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur," a documentary that unearths the material that went into Jack Kerouac's novel "Big Sur."
And for lovers of Japanese sci-fi monsters, there's a 1 p.m. Sunday showing of the most famous of all giant-pterodactyl movies, "Rodan!," in a 35mm Technicolor collector's print.
The Senator is located at 5904 York Road. Call 410-435-8338 or go to senator.com for further details.
Home Movie Day
Baltimore's Strand Theater on Saturday becomes the home of an international celebration, "Home Movie Day," which salutes the way ordinary citizens record family life and local history on personal cameras. Think of it as an "Antiques Roadshow" for amateur shooters: event experts will inspect home movies made in any format (including 8mm, Super 8mm and 16mm) and project them to the audience.
The Strand Theater is located on 1823 N. Charles St. The Center for Home Movies has recently relocated to 1014 W. 36th St. Go to centerforhomemovies.org.
Nineteen23 strikes again
Friday at 9 p.m., the Nineteen23 monthly film series (devoted to nontheatrical short films not available on DVD) unspools an intriguing slate called "AUTOMATIC/withdrawal: Machines in the garden, and gardens of machines." It features 16mm movies that delight in unpredictable or stylized movements, such as Dudley Murphy and Fernand Leger's famous Dadaist spree "Ballet Mecanique," as well as more conventional documentaries such as "A Fatal Beauty," which analyzes the suburbanization of once-rural Montgomery County, Md.
NINETEEN23 presents "AUTOMATIC/withdrawal" at the 14K Cabaret, 218 W. Saratoga St., at 9 p.m. today. Call 410-962-8565.
Bel Air holds a film festival
It's my honor to help kick off the Bel Air Film Festival at 8:30 p.m. today by introducing Victor Fleming's 1937 masterpiece, "Captains Courageous." Jack Gerbes, director of the Maryland Film Office, and Rob Reier, town of Bel Air commissioner, will welcome viewers opening night to a weekend celebration that includes "Afghan Star" Saturday at 4 p.m., the exhilarating Sundance Film Festival award-winner about an "American Idol"-type competition in Afghanistan, and "The English Surgeon" Saturday at 7:30 p.m., a Silverdocs Festival award winner that profiles an Anglo-Saxon neurosurgeon (Henry Marsh) working in the Ukraine. On Sunday, the festival will present local student films from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.
The event takes place as the Bel Air Reckord Armory, 37 N. Main St. Tickets are $5 per person per film. Each ticket includes one complimentary soda and popcorn. Children 10 years of age and younger have free admission to the Friday and Sunday events. Advance tickets are available through Friday, 8:30 .am.-4:30 p.m., at the Town of Bel Air Department of Economic Development located in the Bel Air Reckord Armory, 37 N. Main St. For more information, call 410-838-0584 and ask for Jeanne, visit TownOfBelAirFilmFestival.com or send an e-mail to JWhiskeyman@belairmd.org.
The Vargases kiss. Orson Welles cuts and - kaboom! - he nails down the movie's mood, its setting, its plot and even its racial friction in one audacious piece of virtuoso camera choreography. (The shot clocks in at three minutes and 20 seconds.)
The version of the film that the Charles will present three times in the next seven days, re-edited by Walter Murch in 1998 according to Welles's own editing notes, restores that introduction to its full audiovisual glory.
When Welles signed on with Universal to direct and write as well as act in "Touch of Evil," after nearly a decade abroad, he was fighting for the chance to once again be an American artist working in America. He thoroughly revamped the script, based on Whit Masterson's serviceable policier called "Badge of Evil," making anti-Mexican racism a key issue, telling the story from three different points of view and bringing a tragic dimension to his heavy of heavies - Captain Quinlan, an obsessive police captain with an adoring henchman as well as an instinct for finding culprits and a penchant for framing them. Reversing the racial makeup of two key characters, Welles turned the putative hero (Heston) into Mexican supernarc Vargas and his new wife (Leigh) into a spunky Anglo.
The result was a disreputable classic whose brave sensibility more than matches its towering bravura.
"Touch of Evil" plays at noon Saturday, at 7 p.m. Monday and at 9 p.m. Thursday at the Charles, 1711 N. Charles St. For more information, call 410-727-FILM or go to thecharles.com.
The Senator lives!
Independent film has found a welcome showcase at Baltimore's 900-seat Senator Theatre. At 7:30 p.m. on Saturday it hosts the Baltimore premiere of Giancarlo ("Homicide") Esposito's directorial debut, "Gospel Hill," a drama about a Southern neighborhood ripped apart on racial lines by redevelopment, awakening memories of a black activist assassinated 30 years before. On Monday and Tuesday the Senator presents Curt Worden's "One Fast Move or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur," a documentary that unearths the material that went into Jack Kerouac's novel "Big Sur."
And for lovers of Japanese sci-fi monsters, there's a 1 p.m. Sunday showing of the most famous of all giant-pterodactyl movies, "Rodan!," in a 35mm Technicolor collector's print.
The Senator is located at 5904 York Road. Call 410-435-8338 or go to senator.com for further details.
Home Movie Day
Baltimore's Strand Theater on Saturday becomes the home of an international celebration, "Home Movie Day," which salutes the way ordinary citizens record family life and local history on personal cameras. Think of it as an "Antiques Roadshow" for amateur shooters: event experts will inspect home movies made in any format (including 8mm, Super 8mm and 16mm) and project them to the audience.
The Strand Theater is located on 1823 N. Charles St. The Center for Home Movies has recently relocated to 1014 W. 36th St. Go to centerforhomemovies.org.
Nineteen23 strikes again
Friday at 9 p.m., the Nineteen23 monthly film series (devoted to nontheatrical short films not available on DVD) unspools an intriguing slate called "AUTOMATIC/withdrawal: Machines in the garden, and gardens of machines." It features 16mm movies that delight in unpredictable or stylized movements, such as Dudley Murphy and Fernand Leger's famous Dadaist spree "Ballet Mecanique," as well as more conventional documentaries such as "A Fatal Beauty," which analyzes the suburbanization of once-rural Montgomery County, Md.
NINETEEN23 presents "AUTOMATIC/withdrawal" at the 14K Cabaret, 218 W. Saratoga St., at 9 p.m. today. Call 410-962-8565.
Bel Air holds a film festival
It's my honor to help kick off the Bel Air Film Festival at 8:30 p.m. today by introducing Victor Fleming's 1937 masterpiece, "Captains Courageous." Jack Gerbes, director of the Maryland Film Office, and Rob Reier, town of Bel Air commissioner, will welcome viewers opening night to a weekend celebration that includes "Afghan Star" Saturday at 4 p.m., the exhilarating Sundance Film Festival award-winner about an "American Idol"-type competition in Afghanistan, and "The English Surgeon" Saturday at 7:30 p.m., a Silverdocs Festival award winner that profiles an Anglo-Saxon neurosurgeon (Henry Marsh) working in the Ukraine. On Sunday, the festival will present local student films from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.
The event takes place as the Bel Air Reckord Armory, 37 N. Main St. Tickets are $5 per person per film. Each ticket includes one complimentary soda and popcorn. Children 10 years of age and younger have free admission to the Friday and Sunday events. Advance tickets are available through Friday, 8:30 .am.-4:30 p.m., at the Town of Bel Air Department of Economic Development located in the Bel Air Reckord Armory, 37 N. Main St. For more information, call 410-838-0584 and ask for Jeanne, visit TownOfBelAirFilmFestival.com or send an e-mail to JWhiskeyman@belairmd.org.
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