Ep. 170: It’s All True (1942 & 1993) or ‘It’s STILL All True’

0:00Hey, ladies and gentlemen, this is Zach. I thought I'd get us started off this time. As always, this episode contains course language, talk of film history and general history and the context surrounding this specific motion picture or missing motion picture that was later cobbled together in 1993. Also this episode does contain derogatory language quoted in context both by Orson Welles from the arena documentary, which is cited at the beginning of the movie or the of the episode, not the movie. And then later on it is quoted by myself during our discussion surrounding the South America trip that Orson Welles took and the footage he was filming and how people were reacting to it. Having said that, I do hope that this conversation that is about to unfold and lightens you as much as it enlighten me and Jack as we sat down to talk about one of these wonderful

1:02pieces of lost cinema that thankfully was found in some form and presented to us so that we can see the ways in which Mr. Welles was documenting a story that sadly becomes all too true as history and time has gone on. And here's hoping that it inspires a new generation of people to rise above that fingers crossed. And now I'll take it all over to the arena documentary which will set the scene for our discussion about it's all true. It's gone. Whole end of it. The whole the whole an actual plot was changed. In other words it's about the time major ambison dies. The picture starts to go to become another picture becomes their picture. Do you ever get over something like that?

2:04Not really. You don't. You don't. But you see I was in terrible trouble then because I was sent to South America by Nelson Rockefeller and Jack Whitney. I was told that it was my patriotic duty to go and spend a million dollars shooting the carnival in real. Now I don't like things like carnivals in Mardi Gras and all that but they put it to me that it would be a real contribution to inter-American affairs in the Latin American world and so on so without a salary but with a budget of a million dollars I was sent to Rio to make up a movie about the carnival. But in the meantime comes the new government. Arcade was now a new government and they asked to see the rushes of what I'm doing in South America and they see a lot of people black people and the reaction is he's just shooting a lot of jiggaboo's jumping up and down you know

3:05they didn't even hear the sound of music because it hadn't been synced up so I was fired from archaeo and they made a great publicity point of the fact that I had gone to South America without a script and thrown all this money away. I never recovered from that attack so the fact that they had also they had promised me when I went to South America that they would send a movieola and cut us to me and that I would finish the cutting of ambisons there. They never did they cut it themselves so they destroyed ambisons and the picture itself destroyed me. I was I didn't get a job as director for years afterwards. So Oh, it's not a joke, it's not a joke.

4:07Chalo morriteru, pa' fella, salgueu, mangueira, esta sampa primera, para aios meus pandeiros guardar. Ah eh, porque a escola de Samba não sabe a segunda, erro delanda. Just a year. Valley. Oh, review. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome. Welcome. Welcome to the yesterday, your Valley. Who review many great sites to wait inside the picture palace of the past and we have plenty of ways to talk about the things inside. So hurry and get your seats. Tonight the Valley who is taking its microphones and notebooks all the way to Brazil, where it will come across fascinating sites along the streets, explore inequalities among different class structures and reckon with the legacy of a film that almost was and what it would become. The years are 1942 and 1993. The subject is the one and only Orson Wells and stories you are about to see unfold well as the aptly titled film states. It's all true.

5:30See this show and see behind for discussion to delight the earbuds. The night before I left for South America, having run around the top of the building in the rain for a journey into fear, I went to the projection room about two in the morning, I know four in the morning and then got on the plane and off to real. At the end of civilization, I don't know what to say. When reporters asked Wells what his Brazilian film would be about, he said, ask me again in six months. The lights failed to arrive, so he filmed Carnival with anti-aircraft lights borrowed from the Brazilian Army.

6:33Wells said filming Carnival was like trying to capture a hurricane. I went to the frenzy again and I'm telling it a crazy. People get tired, they fall asleep, they go to lead against the house and that's it. By when, groaning with horror at the start of making a Carnival, as it turned out, it became fascinating with Carnival. It was interesting whether the Samba clubs and all of that which would have been organized and told to people explain what it was socially and all the rest of that. In the frenzy of Carnival, Wells had discovered what the true subject of his film would be. He would tell the story of Samba and where it came from with the help of Brazil's greatest musical artists. Now that you've seen the show, we will get to the talk of the day. Yes, in 1942, Orson Wells's journey to South America as part of the good neighbor policy would prove to be the beginning of the end for Wells's time at RKO Pictures

7:36with the footage he shot in Brazil and Mexico to be dismissed and tossed into a junk drawer by the in-app studio and its malevolent denizens. Luckily, the footage did not suffer the fate of other Wells projects and managed to find their way out of the dustbin of history and present itself as a bold and daring stance in 1942, not just in unveiling a country in real terms, but exploring inequalities in the country that our own country would more than recognize. All of this was presented in 1993 as a documentary compiled by Wells Associate Richard Wilson, Director Bill Crone and Myron Meisel, and historian Catherine Benemau. Then they gave us a more complete glimpse of one of Wells's many unfinished projects, just how did the production of this film unfold and what lessons can it the eventual documentary and footage teach us about the film world in the world at large today. To answer that, we need the help of a return guest who has endured five hours speaking about Wells on this program in the past.

8:37That very situation was brought up to the United Nations recently as a boarded violation of the Geneva Convention. He is also an educator, historian and festival director who brings buoyant life and joy to the Colorado film scene. Please welcome back Jack Hanley. I am so happy to be here and I would like to think our eternal legacy is that five hour plus podcast. Yep. Well, welcome, buddy. First of all, before we get to any brass tax, let me give you a hug. Yes, always. Why am I going to give you a hug? Because this world sucks. It does. It does. Yes, but I hope your amazing and beautiful listeners can escape that for a while. Yes. And we can come together to talk about an amazing film and I would argue an even more amazing filmmaker. Yes, I agree. And also just as much as we're going to provide a little bit of an escape. I can't help but think some very, very prescient issues are going to come to the forefront by the very end of the discussion. But let's stick in La La land for a second. Sure. Sure. So we're talking about Wells again, but we're talking about him from a very different vantage point.

9:41So I can't, I think almost in tandem with whenever somebody discovers Orson Wells, one finds out that it's not just about the limited amount of films he made. It's about the many that never got the never job made. Yes. Yeah, the never was. I didn't fully grasp it until after pain watching Citizen Kane and then seeing all the different projects and it felt overwhelming. So when I finally dug deeper into research with Wells over time, there are so many ideas he had that I almost like I selfishly would trade other films he made in exchange for that in weird places. Like the deep is one that I keep wanting to see because it just sounds like a great idea that he could pull off magnificently. And like it's no different than wanting to see the definitive version of Mr. Arcotton or the other side of the wind, which I like those versions that we have, but they're still not Wells's stuff.

10:49I kind of want to know like your stance as we go into this, how do you feel about filmmakers of any sort. Where we don't have their full vision what we have is what we have and we have to kind of deal with it. How do you feel about those kind of projects kind of springing to life as their own entity like we're about to talk about today. Yeah, I know I have rather mixed feelings about that if I'm being honest because in a sense I love I think the ambiguity can help steer a work of art toward greatness when we play the card of what if. And I would argue that with some directors far more greatly than others and in this case I think we may have the greatest almost film in all of cinematic history with what we're about to discuss today. I'll profit that right. Yeah, so I think that's important. I'm also continually fascinated also as a historian in general right if you examine great historical ruins of antiquity.

11:51Right, it is just as important about what it was as it is important to examine how it fell. Yeah, how it went into disrepair. Right. And in that sense what I find with with Orson Wells always is just not only wondering what could have been in this great vision and there's going to be some elements that I'm going to drop on why I think this film is so important. And why it matters so much. But I'm also just we learned so much about him as a filmmaker in what was missing how this all came to be and the forces that made it happen thusly. So you know I'm just I'm eternally fascinated by this in many cases I'm not necessarily a fan of having to seek down and piece together and employ various types of generative devices to recreate it right. I love a little bit of mystery. You know that about me and I live in the margins of ambiguity in a sense of my deep and passionate respect for this filmmaker as you well know.

12:53But yeah, in this case it's going to be it's fascinating to examine. But what you're telling me in the long run is I can't have you over for any iterations of mystery of Edwin Druid. And it's not like I wanted to throw a Charles Dickens party. It's not like that was going to be my 35th birthday party in a couple of weeks. But fine. I'll do it alone. Never. Yeah, by the way, that might end up being an episode sometime down the line because I would like to talk about Dickens and cinema. But but at any rate. Yeah, this one, this one, I agree it's it's of all the unfinished projects. This might be the most perfect one. And what's frustrating is we really only have a percentage of it. Whereas juxtaposed to like other side of the wind, we have virtually everything. There's virtually nothing missing. Right. That's right. And the amount that was already that needed to be completed was the most minimal. This one is missing footage because some of it wasn't preserved properly over time.

13:56The trajectory of that footage is interesting because it didn't just get tossed away like the ambresons footage did. It managed to stay in vaults. Desi Arnez ran into this footage at some point. Then it just stayed there and part of this is because RKO got sold off partially because Howard Hughes ran it into the ground because he's Howard Hughes. And then Desi Lou picks up the archives of it. Then Paramount picks up Desi Lou. Then Paramount has the footage. And oh, by the way, for listeners of the future Paramount used to be a reputable studio. He made really great things. Jesse Lasky and Adolf Zucker really made a powerful studio. It is not that anymore. It has now become a shell of itself run by an inept billionaire with a news department run by an idiot. And that's at least the iteration. We hope our future listeners are finding it. It may be running some sort of militaristic force by that.

14:57I hope y'all found a robot version of Edward Armero. Robo Mero. But no, Paramount had it. And this was a time where Paramount probably had a little bit more capital around to fully do something with this. And it doesn't hurt that you also have foreign production entities contained within it. But one of the things I'll state before we get into the production of this film is that it's the one film of Wells that I would argue is sadder to me than Amberson. Because in a lot of ways, I would prefer to have this full story over the full Amberson. And I'm saying it's somebody who really likes Amberson. But this one has a sense of urgency to it then as it does now. And it's telling a story that no one knows about. I know about rich people and their fall and decline. Like I get it. I get it.

15:57It keeps happening all the time. I hope it's coming soon. But in the case of the Django deros and the Samba and even up to Benito, which we have the least amount of footage of. Yes. These are stories that are like, I don't fucking know these stories. I didn't grow up with these. Nobody was teaching these in my history class in high school. Right. Well, I think that's the important point here to remember to exact is that this is why I mean, obviously any sort of like lost piece of art, the ramifications and the absence, right? The weight of its absence on our cultural legacy is always ways heavy, right? But in this case too, from a historian's perspective, well, as well, this is less just a traditional piece of art we've lost. As much as it was this once in a lifetime collision between art and history and geopolitic. Yeah. The ramifications of this astonishing confrontation that our beloved director found himself on the losing end of sadly has such weight throughout our entire geopolitic, our entire history of colonialization and propaganda and state department shenanigans all the way up to a relevancy that we still feel today.

17:15It's the terms of how soft power and, you know, visual propaganda gets deployed. So I think that I feel the loss of this one so much harder. Yeah. Then it had it just been a traditional piece of art. Right. And it's weird because it sounds like for the most part, if Wells tried to get the, but this is a spoiler for the end of it. Well, try to get the footage. And that's why he was taking a lot of acting gigs after RKO let him go. And he went into Jane air and played Mr. Rochester. And then he was picking up other jobs where he can and he always kept trying to go back to this film and just never came to fruition. If the material had been preserved properly, we'd have even not only would we have even more to talk about. But we may have had like a better like short film even than four men on a raft, which even as complete as it feels is still incomplete. The car of all footage would have been fascinating if he had been allowed to trace the origin properly as he wanted to. And Benito the bull is it's based on a rubber flyer story, but it's still a story that incorporates Mexican heritage and a sense of reality.

18:22Like the footage we see of Benito in the documentary is very much more about a ritual, like a blessing of animals than anything else. That's where I agree we lose some kind of a geopolitical piece of information for our brains to digest and to understand another culture better. And so like that's all the more reason why I kind of wanted to talk about this in addition to the fact that there are certain elements of this production that and what happened with it that I found all too familiar in the modern context. But in order to tell the story properly, of course, you do need good resources. So I've been using for mainly for this Hello Americans, which is volume two of Orson Wells by Simon Callow. And the it's all true journey written by Catherine Benemou, which in full disclosure, I did not have time to read every single bit of it. I mainly stuck to production facts because that's usually what we do. But it's interesting because I will love talking about this with you first and then reading Benito.

19:25Then it's for you. I'm so glad you said that. Yeah, and then either we do a follow up or at the very least be like write down like any observations we have after the fact of knowing what Benemou's book did digs in. Yes, quite literally in my own hand written notes the same echoing the same sentiment. Absolutely. For folks who do want to read it, it has been republished. It's called it's all true. Orson Wells is Pan American Odyssey. And she, by the way, was one of the producers and research executives for the it's all true documentary that we're talking about. But let's talk a little bit about that. We're actually going. This is a bit of a direct sequel to our Citizen Kane episode, which means we'll be here. With the people we're clamoring for, I mean. Yes. And I would like to think that the people demanded this. Yes. And just like how Avengers Infinity War leads in the end game, it means it's going to be five and a half hours, not five. No, no, I promise. If you hear one advantage that archaeo gave us is because there's very little to see we don't have to be here.

20:27That's long. But anyway, midst of the release of Citizen Kane, Wells is already looking into his next project. Now, I always knew it originally to be, well, he picked Ambrison's right after this. And he also decided to do Journey into Fear and then his ability to even remotely try to direct it was hampered by the fact that he has to go to South America was not true. In fact, it's all true. Was going to be the next project. And the compendium was basically an anthology of four sections. It was going to be something called jazz session. A story called Love Story, Benito the Bull and the captain's chair. Jam Session at one point had the involvement of Duke Ellington. That's a whole side story that I don't have. I don't have time to talk about it other than it would have been great. Yes, no notes. I want it. Yeah. Benito and the captain's chair were written by Robert Flarrity. Robert Flarrity is known for the documentary question mark Nanook of the North.

21:29Which if anybody doesn't want to watch that, you should watch the documentary now that makes fun of it. Probably one of the greatest. It's up there. It's up there. It is great. The only one that's better is them making fun of the kids' pictures. So basically he gets a crew set up to do this. It would have been originally titled Pan American, but then it's changed. It's all true. Toland, our boy Toland was going to be the cinematographer. And then he enlisted in Field Photo, which was the Navy unit ran by John Ford. And Toland would end up directing a movie called Pearl Harbor. And he made it badly. He made every... You know what? Gone with the wind has a lot of problems. Indeed. Somehow it wasn't as problematic as Greg Toland's Pearl Harbor movie. As in all sums of good Pearl Harbor iterations, right? Oh, successful. Hot take here. Hot take here for the audience. Michael Bay's Pearl Harbor.

22:31Less racist than Greg Toland's Pearl Harbor. Right, somehow. Yes. And Ford had to fix it. They told Toland, no. What the fuck did you do, Greg? Ah, shit. John, get in here. We need you to fix this shit. But anyway, so he's out. Now, at that point, Wells gets Benito on track. But Perk Hallow, he kind of impulsively also sets his sights into Journey in the Fear and Ambersons. Now, this is where he assigns Norman Foster to take the reins. Norman Foster is actually a huge staple in Wells's work. He goes all the way up into the other side of the wind. And he actually might be one of my favorite characters on the other side of the wind. Yeah. But he gets him into the director's chair for Benito. Wells sets down to Mexico with Foster and cameraman, Elle Gilks, for a few days to get it underway. He was basically going to supervise the project long distance. And if that sounds familiar and sad, just you wait.

23:34Now, he is, he institutes, um, uh, actor, Jesus Vesquez as the best friend of Benito. And Jesus Solorzano as the bullfighter in the story. Um, and bullfighting is a very huge part of Wells's life. Yes, it is. Um, now, Callow kind of describes the relationship of Foster and Wells and how they were getting it made. Benito, the bull meanwhile was approaching the commencement of principal photography. The cast was in place, uh, with our actors playing Chico and the bullfighter in place. Foster wrote regularly to Wells from Mexico describing the problems in sending screen tests. The two men had formed sort of a relationship that Wells was always able to inspire his fellow workers. One of extraordinary familiarity and affection, playful, rather saucy, but with an unmistakable undertow of real emotion. Foster was fully 15 years older than Wells. He had been acting since the early 20s and had more experience than Wells in every department of filmmaking.

24:35But he instantly accepted the young man's leadership in response of one of Foster's anxious first telegrams. Wells wired back simply, I love you. But the crisis was real. Difficulties with the weather, the bulls, the actors, the cameras, personally Foster writes back. I'll never feel sorry for a bull in the corrida dintons. I hate the bastard. I hate the bastard. We love you so much that it's killing us that we aren't having any better luck. But we're doing everything we can and by God and Jesus will get it this year. We'll get it here. Wells replied by telegram. We all miss you terribly. Believe me, our troubles here are as numerous and as better as yours without the dialect. Money senses to be a main problem. Moss promises to send money stop. He is printing it this afternoon stop. Loved last batch of film, much love orson.

25:36Even in a telegram, one catches his electrical effect. Now, they're having problems, but they're able to actually get this done. And the footage, the way it looks in what we'll talk about eventually, I wouldn't call it Wellsian. I wouldn't not call it Wellsian either. Sure. Like it's, we don't really know how much it would have been differed by Foster's direction. And for people who haven't watched Journey into Fear, the good news is it's actually got released not too long ago by Warner Archive. Foster, I hadn't seen it until that release. Foster definitely listened to Orson. So I have a feeling that it would have been the same here. And there are some angles in the church that kind of evoke this too. But on the whole, it's smoother than one would expect to direct long distance. And it's something that actually relates to recent days, because Peter Jackson was having to do that, supervising multiple units on Lord of the Rings. There are snags that get hit it though.

26:38The funds for Bonito get tapped, which is kind of evidenced in that last telegram. The executive producer Jose Noriega, wire Jack Moss, Wells's manager for more money. The camera operator, Gilks, was then summoned to Washington for federal government work. He is replaced by the equally great substitute of Floyd Crosby. Floyd Crosby had not, he didn't do too much. He was just worked with flattery and mornow on a movie called Taboo, and won an Oscar for it. So, I mean, if you got to replace people, I guess you could do people doing worse. Now, Wells would keep checking in from time to time. Callow wrote that he visited the set in mid-October again with his then-girlfriend Dolores Del Rio. And he brought back footage with him. And when he showed it to the RKO executives, they were thrilled. You asked me to be brutally frank Wells telegram foster. Okay, stop. The film is absolutely wonderful. Stop. I will repeat that the film is completely marvelous.

27:40Very, very exciting. And as beautiful as anything you ever saw in your life, stop. From now on, you are officially credited as his co-director of Bonito, and God bless you. Orson. That was oddly the same review I gave the day the Earth level of neatins moving. Marvel is very, very exciting. Foster Wild, wire back, clearly touched. You are a really sweet guy. Thanks from all of us. So, they are excited about this. They are actually excited about this. Now, through all of this, Wells continued to direct Bonito from a long distance with high exuberance. There are multiple things that you're going to be able to read in the final notes that are published on the website. Mostly dealing from Callow's section on telegrams. I don't want to go too far into it. But needless to say, everybody's having fun. Everybody's engaged in this project. I will say, though, there were some problems with the bulls. Yes. I'm going to read this all because bulls. Like, not from Chicago, from Mexico.

28:41Callow writes in his book, despite the characteristic hilarity and excitement that Wells generated among his collaborators, filming was very tough. The bullfighter, Solarzano, was temperamental, as were the rancheros, and indeed the bull itself. The shoot was physically dangerous on several levels. One of the fighters got badly gored. Yeah. Shit. Then his brother was held up by gangsters stripped and had his face slashed with a machete. Several times we've been afraid we were going to be held up, wrote Foster. Noriega wrote to Wells, proposing the two shut down the film over winter to resume in February or March. At which point Wells would take the helm to shoot the bullfight sequence and the scene in which Bonito gets away and rampages through the village. Wells wrote back to reassure them of how really and truly beautiful and important is the picture you're making. I hope you believe me. Let me interject something here. Yeah. I'm concerning the bullfighting as well.

29:41As you were driving to meet me here, I sent you a text I didn't know if you were able to open. And your listeners can only see this is a photograph of my my great uncle, Javier Dela Nunez. Oh, really? It was himself a bullfighter. Repeat that name again. Javier Dela Nunez. Woo. And so that's on my mother's side. And yeah. So I kind of know a little bit about just how unpredictable and unstable it is to try to make reality conform to art in the arena of bullfighting. Just absolutely ridiculous to control. Everything is so difficult to predict. Yeah. Which makes it. One thing for your listeners, just as the thing I would like to add, it is both, I think maybe you could probably phrase it best as to quote the great Irish poet more like a terrible beauty in its construction. You have parts of ritualism behind bullfighting. You have a long history of cultural, you know, of nuance behind it.

30:41But it is also brutal. It is savage. It is cool. Yeah. And in places too. So I think one of the best representations that I could recommend was one of the best documentaries I saw this year made my short list called Afternoons of Solitude. Oh. It is by the director Albert Cera. And it follows the bullfighter Andrés Rocare from a Peruvian bullfighter. And it is cinema, verite, bullfighting, following him from the car to the arena to the encounters. Then bloody and injured back in the car in a succession. And I've never seen a documentary like this capture what that is. So I highly recommend this. Yeah. You know, it's funny. Like, I'd be hard pressed to think of many films in my life that I've seen that actually do bullfighting. Yeah. I mean, I've only seen an animation really honestly. Like Lootitude is my best reference for what bullfighting is. And obviously that is not an accurate representation. No, that's right. And there's a reason it's it is being banned further, right?

31:41You know, like I said, actually, you're listening, especially those, you know, kind-hearted ones. Right. It is honest depiction of death in this arena, right? A very Hemingway ask to talk about someone who once had a fist fight with Orson Welch in the theater. Another added thing to the syllabus is to go to YouTube and look up Orson Welch's describing how he baited Hemingway into a fight in the theater. Yeah. By adopting the persona of, oh, Mr. Hemingway, you're so tough. And so, you know, I just, when it ended in a big fist fight, look up that it's priceless footage. Is it connection to an incomplete Wells project that got completed? That's right. The Jake Hanterford character in other side of the wind is kind of meant to be a Hemingway substitute. Like, because everybody thinks what was about Orson? Like, nah, exactly. Yeah, no. But this documentary, I just recommend it. It's brutal. It's terrible. And it's savage. It's sad. But it's also just cinema veritate at its peak, which I haven't seen done, rarely seen done like that. And I think for our listeners that would be to really emphasize what this was like, the problems trying to be able to contain all of these forces and this bloodlust to this artistic, you know,

32:53you know, raining in and how difficult that was and unpredictable, I could only imagine. So, yeah, when we speak about filming back then, and even what Wells was doing, like, let's compare it to the Jean Gladeros for a minute, they're shooting some, well, a lot of that stuff out on the open walk. That's right. There's some cheating going in some closeups. Okay, fine, it's a movie. It's going to happen. But I would imagine that a bullfight would be even harder to film because of unpredictability. Number one, and number two, safety. Proximity. Proximity, right? Yeah, it's just. Yeah, I, I, it's always a kind of amazing that Wells never fought harder to get some of that on screen in other films he do. Like, I, because it's something he was obsessed with. And he, like, when he went to Spain, amid the communist accusations, that's something he would find footage of him constantly in that way. That's right. Or Spain or elsewhere. Now, all is going well. More, all is going okay. Seems like everything's kind of underway.

33:54And then Japan had to bomb Pearl Harbor. Isn't it always the case? As it always is. You're doing fine in your projects. Everything's good. You're going to be on your way towards the second Oscar nomination if not win. And then Japan has to bomb Pearl Harbor. Yes, three days after Pearl Harbor. The war is on. And the Office of Inter-American Affairs was hard at work at trying to contain things. Because South America was in the crosshairs of fascism. Or at least there was a worry. Yes, there was a worry. And there was some flirtation. Because from the purposes of this film were really focused on Brazil. President Vargas in Brazil. Not really a president. More of a dictator. A dictator. He had Nazi sympathizers in his cabinet. So Nelson Rockefeller and Jacques Whitney are in tandem with the U.S. government.

34:57Really wanting to avoid Vargas going any further down the fascistic rabbit hole that he already was in. And so among the initiatives was a good neighbor policy. This good neighbor policy was established. And it was sending very illuminated creatives down to South America to engage in projects that promoted South America. Specifically not just for travel, but in terms of international unity. So the Office of Inter-American Affairs requested under a sense of urgency for him to travel to South America as part of a pan-American effort at showing solidarity with South America. And specifically, they wanted Wells to shoot and shape a film surrounding the famous Rio de Janeiro carnival. Now, Wells pretty much said, I know nothing of carnival. Let alone the carnival. But it wouldn't have mattered because Wells would have figured out a way to do this.

35:58I do want to break down what the IAA did. From Callow, because I think it's important context for a reason. So the coordinator and prime mover of the office was Nelson Rockefeller, the eager beaver to end all eager beaver. And vice president Wallace's phrase. He had convinced the administration of Roosevelt to transform the office's budget of three million per annual to 14 million. He worked not only of his persuasiveness, but of the importance of what came to be known as Hemispheric Unity. I'll say that again for anybody who doesn't know what they should be doing. Hemispheric Unity. And it is more than likely that the suggestion that Wells should direct the proposed film came from him. As a major shareholder in RKO, and an early and vigorous supporter of Wells's original contract with the company, Rockefeller had reason to know his work and would certainly have known of his slated projects beneath of the bulls at Mexico

37:04and the other South American parts of its all true whose outline was still quite vague. Rockefeller may also, as Frank Brady has suggested, have been helping RKO out at a difficult moment. And what difficult moment could that be? Well, RKO was run by people who don't know how to make money or use money. They never did. And so Wells did accept it. It took 24 hours for him to make up his mind about Jacques Whitney's offer. His decision was a popular one. Callow went on to state that on December 11th, Phil Reisman was writing to Joseph Breen. They, the Brazilians, feel that the sending of Orson Wells by RKO to cover the current of all, which is so close to them and so near to their hearts, was a most magnificent gesture. And it is highly appreciated by the Brazilian people in the Brazilian government. Orson Wells has looked upon by the Brazilian people as one of the great theater and picture personalities in the United States. And he has in his makeup exactly what the people, these people like, the compliment we are paying him by sending the best man in Hollywood to cover this is greatly appreciated.

38:10So everybody likes this idea. So in the early months of January, Wells is still wrapping up both Amber Sins and Journey into Fear and because this trip is on the docket, he has to basically stretch himself thin and direct both Amber Sins and produce Journey into Fear with studios basically back to back on the lot. He is running himself thin as all could be. And now he goes into a meeting with Harry Hopkins, one of the founders and creators of the works projects administration. And at that time, he was the special advisor on foreign affairs. And in this meeting also was RKO in technical and he established that he wanted this film to be an RKO film subsidized by the government from their other matters are raised. Unfortunately, that subsidation deal falls into a deeper well of RKO trying to find a reason to get rid of Wells, partially because they didn't get the full subsidies that they probably would have been owed.

39:11Partially because they also they interfered a little too much and they lost that money as a result, but technical or had anxieties not by the company but by Wells. He had never worked with it before and he's actually pretty well known for saying that black and white is the actress friend, which is true. They were there was anxiety by Wells because filming the carnival and technical or would be difficult. Now, prior to the invention of the monopack, you're running three strips of film in a very heavy camera, very fucking heavy. But the monopack was able to use one negative instead of three. So that kind of solves part of the problem. But there's still kind of a worry of the use of the tech. So they're eventually going to have to do something about splitting time between the actual carnival and they set up in a studio lot to rebuild the policies. Now, film stock was to be brought by the US to South America. Nothing from South America is being provided on that front. The cost of the production production ended up falling into 1.2 million from RKO with a $300,000 assurance by the US government.

40:20The only thing that really isn't brought up is the content of the film. What is it going to be? Now, Harry Hopkins suggested it would be interesting to make a travel log. And he wanted to call it Orson Well sees America. No comment is recorded that obviously, but obviously, Wells did not approve of that. What's more, it sounds like that Wells wanted to take this down the route he wanted to make it's all true. So, Callo kind of reports in here. I think this is interesting. The Office of Inter-American Affairs, if not the government, wanted something more than a travel log. And it's indicated in a memo written to Jack Wittney by the Brazilian division, a mere day after Wells had agreed to direct it. Reporting the great excitement in Brazil and the idea of Wells coming to Rio, the writer suggested as possible as a possible subject, the heroic journey recently made by some fishermen, the Jean Glideros, from Forteleza in the foreign north of the country.

41:24They had traveled in astonishing 3,000 miles of rough coastal seas on a raft to deliver a petition to the president of Argus in Rio de Janeiro, demanding the right to form unions and receive retirement pensions. These Jean Glideros are almost legendary figures in Brazil and a well executed short subject of the type suggested should have an enthusiastic following both in Brazil and in the United States. How could this fit into the carnival sequence was unclear, but the idea no doubt so to see in Wells's mind. And if I may here, and I'm sorry, I think some historical perspective, I think we also should kind of touch on here. A couple points, I think it is important that we note that I think we can generally agree here that even though Wells himself is very publicly a self identified progressive, he's a pro new deal, pro FDR figure. He went into this with true good faith that this is the patriotic thing to do in the shattering moment, right, of our entry into the Great War.

42:31And this is, of course, this whole thing is itself a Franklin Delano Roosevelt policy, right, the good neighbor policy. And at the time, I think it also should be noticed that by the time Wells actually arrives, Vargas is already leaning toward the allied, the allied side. Yes, so it's a little bit less persuasion, but more about this is for the first time and I think this is very important where Hollywood briefly but importantly becomes an arm of foreign policy here. This was the intended thing and both sides could benefit, right, the idea and even alluded to it before. I think one of the terms I saw in a note was they called it hemispheric solidarity. If we can try to craft this to show that we are united in this stance, it would be great, but Vargas himself also has a bit of a problem, right, Vargas, if not a full on dictator, is at least like a very heavily authoritarian strong man. He comes to power in 1930 and originally tries to declare himself I am a modernizing president of Brazil and I want to try to demonstrate a very modern, progressive Brazil to the world state.

43:41I want to make Rio's trains run on time. Exactly right. So in the course of that though, he immediately realizes an interesting for a world leader, he also just really begins to understand the power that the moving image and visual representation has to that end. So we quickly dissolves Congress and he installs his own authoritarian regime. Oh, that's always a great idea. And nothing we're close to seeing. And establish it as what's called the Estado Nova or the new state. So this is a period in Brazil's history of at least authoritarian rule from 1937 to 1945. This becomes a precursor for what would later be the Brazilian authoritarian military dictatorship, which took place from like 64 all the way up through 1985. A brutal time period that is so wonderfully depicted in one of this years and one of my favorite films of the year in the Oscar nomination race, the secret agent. That is the time period that we are discussing.

44:42This episode won't go out when this is coming out, but I am going to try to get up to the dairy to see it because I wanted to see this movie. It's astonishing. And I would argue the perfect bookend for one battle after another when you specifically speak about the legacy of absent fathers and sons and having code names and dual identities in the face of rebellion against an authoritarian government. It is the perfect bookend. Is the movie approved by the Christmas Adventure Club? Oh, this one goes well beyond. It is absurd and has magical realism and I assert even the better of the two and you know how much I love the form. But I think it's kind of important to kind of know that while Vargas, this whole enterprise, Vargas sees the opportunity. Yes. If I can bring in these amazing filmmakers, in this case, particularly Wells and have him demonstrate or show the modern Brazil that I want to have represented. And this will be key into the absolute shit show that comes forth out of this.

45:45These competing visions of what Vargas wanted Brazil to be represented at and what Wells actually shot and who he focused on. Yes. This is that centerpiece. I'm glad you brought that up on a great segue into something that I wanted to talk about as a follow up to the jungle their story. Consistent four men on a raft. The leader is Jacaray. Yes. Jacaray gets them over to Rio de Janeiro. Big stink is made. Finally, Vargas tells them we're going to give you these benefits. Or so he says, uh, Jacaray's political activities would become a thorn in Vargas's side. And it certainly would create a problem for a government such as the US trying to keep a solitary coalition together while also letting this filmmaker do what he does. And this is the problem. If you wanted to do this, you should have got Scott John Ford to do it.

46:49Absolutely right. Because he would say I don't care about any people of color. That's exactly right. I'll just shoot this fancy carnival. But this was the grand mistake with Orson and why I fucking love Orson. Yes. Orson, when he gets down to Brazil, he sees the racial disparity between darker skin Brazilians and lighter skin Brazilians. Uh, and that plays a factor into the jungle their history of large. But I will point out though, um, there's no script in advance for this Richard Wilson told site and sound in the autumn of 1970 no script was possible until Wells had actually seen the carnival, which is there. He actively said out loud, I know nothing of this shit. I'll figure it out on the way home. Um, RKO in the coordinators office understood this though. So, and that's important to me because RKO knows that they're going to be throwing some of the money down the toilet right because they're banking on him finding a way to make this work.

47:52So that's why my sympathy for them doesn't really jive. Um, but, uh, yeah, no, no, not at all. Um, but these were the ground was over accepted by everybody. Now, uh, he does go to Washington and gets briefed before immediate departure. Venomow surmises something pretty interesting, which is that she believes that Wells was among the likely was likely among the folks sent as goodwill ambassadors. They were also asked to do intelligence gathering for the United States. Yes, I, I don't, I, I don't know with that assertion. No, you know, as a historian, I think there needs to be much more of a burden of proof. Jack, Jack, Jack. Can I tell you now that the truth can be told? Let's just say that, uh, Ian wrote his spy after me, but just decided to make a little thinner. You're the better jawline. I'm just saying, I wasn't a spy, but I wasn't not a spy.

48:54No, this, this sounds like the information gathering kind of like everybody knows this story. Harpo Marx went to Russia for a concert, but he was also querying letters back and forth, which is one of the best Harpo Marx stories that ever existed. Um, so it would make sense that he would be debriefed after returning. Of course. As whatever. Yeah. I don't know if Walt Disney had the same situation going on, but it wouldn't surprise me if he didn't. And of the two RKO directors or creative sent out there, RKO is adjacent to Disney Disney with Saludos Amigos does exactly with the Vargas government wants. Uh, well, it's not so much. Can I just say send broad him up? Yeah. I was actually the funny part is I know when we were discussing this ahead of time that we were going to get together. One of the things we discussed to is like, what would be the entry point where maybe you first heard of Orson's time in there? And I had to think back and realized, I think it was the late 1980s, early 90s, when I first became aware of three caballeros.

50:00And my instant love for that, I mean, who doesn't want to be Pinchinto Pistoles? Obviously someone who, from my mother's side of Heritage and who once fed me stories of how her grandmother once in her village helped prepare food for Pancho Vía. Who made me immediately be like, oh, I love this illusion of who Pinchito is. I fell in love with that little Disney thing. And then it just took me down this rabbit hole of discussing what the hell was Walt Disney doing there? Who else was there and then led me into this? So I just thought that was a good sign. No, not only did, no, I love the hearing that. And if people do want a little bit more info on that, there is a bit of a, it's a Disney documentary. So take it with a great assault. But Walt and El Grupo is a great documentary about the time that Walt and the animators were down there in South America for that issue. Now, Wells heads on down to South America five days before the carnival. Filming begins on February 8th, 1942.

51:03He has a total of 27 crew members working for him. Wells arrived in Brazil with strictly the carnival and the story of the Jango Deiros as part of the plan. By June of 1942, there is an account of what has been filmed and compiled by the international photographers, June Issue. They include three pre-carnival celebrations in Rio and its environs, four nights and three days of the carnival, which required improvised lighting and sound techniques that proved a great success, every conceivable scenic attraction in the city and surrounding the hills and mountains, test footage of the fishermen in Fortaleza, and the three-day Easter ceremony in Oro Preto, every Samba nightclub in Rio with most of the scenes rehearsed and staged, the reenactment of the arrival of the Jango Deiros in Rio Harbor, and two weeks of close-ups and orchestra recordings made at the Synodia Studios, which Wells rented out. The Synodia Studios specifically was designed to rebuild a specific square of Brazil that Vargas had basically demoed,

52:05so they can't do the carnival there anymore, and I had the name of it from the documentary itself. The Pazalones says, I think this is how you pronounce it, the Pazalones says, and because they raised it, it had to basically be rebuilt. There's a song in the documentary that I love. They're going to raise the Pazalones say, there'll be no more Samba schools, the Tamborum is weeping, the entire hill is weeping. It gives you a sense of Vargas would be willing to do that, even though it would look bad on him if Wells were to tell the full story of what happened, because here's the thing, once he gets down there and sees the carnival happening, he becomes entranced with the origins of Samba. Let's go back to the original ideas about trying to tell a story about the origins of jazz. This falls in love, he is seduced, I think is the best way to describe it.

53:08We'll talk about the carnival footage after we go through some quick notes on it. The first one is there's a crew of 12 with the RKO Technicolor unit, and it is supplemented by a smaller black and white crew. Now, Benimo breaks down what everybody was used for, because this was an experimental first use of Technicolor to shoot primary action at a foreign location. A black and white crew was necessary during the initial stages as a backup mechanism. It turned, it moved on to the second unit work as soon as the Technicolor test reels showed good results. The use of silent black and white equipment also provided the crew with more mobility and time, flexibility to shoot secondary scenes and locations, which could prove crucial in the editing stage. Coverage of the festivities by the two crews ranged from the neighborhood street celebrations in the daytime to dancing in private clubs and the official Samba school procession at night. Since the lighting equipment did not arrive on time in the main celebration, probably because RKO forgot to fucking do it like they forget to do everything.

54:09The Brazilian Air Force lent the crews a set of anti-aircraft search lights for nighttime shooting. He's serendipitously symbolic demonstration of Brazil's new pro-allied stance and of the strategic importance of culturally oriented filmmaking to the war effort. At some point throughout this process, Wells even himself even starts picking up a Mitchell camera. Oh, that's what I mean. I love there's a shot from footage of him with his 16 millimeter. I can't think. Passing like a specter through the crowd. I can't think of a photograph designed to give a film nerd an orgasm. Yeah, that's as perfect as that. I'm glad you were as equally around. Oh, I had to hide my intent in my pants. What are you talking about, man? Now, here's the thing. There is a bit of the recreation that we were discussing. I do want to talk about that. In the weeks following the festivities Wells and his crew began using the facilities

55:10at the local synodia studio, as well as a recognizable urban location such as the modest neighborhood of Quentino and the centrally located Theatro Menus Pal to orchestrate a reenactment of selected Carnival festivities. The Carnival balls for the elite, the Cordoes, groups of celebrants, that snaked through the neighborhood streets and the corsos and the motorcades that permeated downtown Rio. These scenes were to be combined with the Carlier footage of shot off the cuff to form a loosely woven double-edged narrative account of Brazil, Brazilian Carnival, and all of its social and cultural dimensions. The spectator would be presented with a panorama that extended from neighborhood Samba jamming sessions amid hanging laundry and unpaid streets to the most picturesque tourist attractions of Brazil's capital city, the Sugar Loaf Mountain, Christ the Redeemer statue, and the short front casinos.

56:10Again, he starts becoming a neighbor with the Samba. There's specific attention that is made to certain musical numbers in that footage. Unfortunately, we don't get to fully experience. There is no sound crew in here. He's basically filming the dances themselves and he's going to eventually work with musician and composer Heravelto Martins, who is a known composer in Brazil, and work with him as the local music history expert. The additional factor of this is that he is bringing in Brazilian journalists to help him shape some of these stories. So he's working on a couple of different fronts that are very overwhelming, and a lot of them will be presented in the full notes that people can read. But I want to talk about the footage, because I can't think of a more realistic connecting point

57:19between technical footage that was shot on the streets to a color film we see now, Wells and his crew, which I'm assuming had technical or experts on the ground, because they were very finicky about that technology, especially because they didn't want to get Natalie Kalmas calling him in the middle of the night with threats, that it felt like I was watching at the very least 80s footage handheld, where the stock just kind of felt like it was up to that snuff. But it's technical, so it looks more vibrant, and it looks more gorgeous. It's kind of remarkable to watch evidence of people being wrong about the need of segregation, because I'm watching lighter skinned people and darker skinned people dancing together. I'm glad you mentioned that here, because I think that's what's impaired of also, forever for Orson, the great leftist in this sense.

58:19What he encounters there is seeing the energy, the experiencing of people of color, experiencing joy, which I think still is somewhat shocking to the American sensibility, given the bruhaha over the Super Bowl entertainment. Wait, wait, wait, what happened? Apparently. Did a gentleman named Rude Rabbits happen to perform? This rather rude, the rude rabbit, yes. Oh, wait, I'm sorry, bad, bad bunny. Dared to demonstrate to just a bit of brown people expressing joy, and that's enough to make everyone, you know, need a safe space orchestrated by one kid rock. It would have been even more profound if I had shot it. Oh my god, yes. But seeing that, I think that was such a clue again for Orson, what I absolutely, fundamentally love about him, not as a filmmaker, but as a goddamn human being, right?

59:19He sees this joy, and he sees fundamentally also a black origin story for Somba, for the music of trying to discover this is something by the black community here, and it is something that a type of thing that is, we can't recognize in the United States, right? The great irony here is, of course, we come down as these cultural ambassadors, right? From the State Department and RKO with all of this intentionality to try to bring down the gravitas of the great United States, and it is here at Carnival mixing with the people that he realizes, oh, there are greater freedoms here. There's greater joy here. And so I think that how that profoundly changes him, that makes Orson radical, in my opinion. He now starts, and he makes him freaking political. And this is a political choice. I would argue right here, this is the real birth of it. If he didn't already, he, of course, had these sensibilities, as you and I know from his history. But here, I think, started to fundamentally change how he decided,

1:00:23and who, more importantly, he was going to decide to film during this process. It also lends to who he would put as a co-pilot in the seat. So I mentioned the composer who was going to help him. Heather Velto Martins basically acted as an assistant director to Wells, in specifically effectively designing and choreographing the Synodias Studio's footage. And so he's able to bring the authenticity that is necessary. The footage, too, also manages to... It's not even just joy, too. It's like, it's a time capsule that's rare. And it's one that's kind of unafraid to also be a Hollywood movie. Yeah, you can tell what footage is on the street versus what's in the studio.

1:01:23You can tell by lighting schemes. You can tell by what they're able to move around with. And I find it interesting that both him and Walt Disney kind of had a similar... A similar visual aesthetic they wanted to capture in some form of fashion. They're going to divvy in other places, right? Sure. But they both saw the colorful nature of something that is not native to this country. That's right. And it does provide a good cultural exchange tool. And I like that. Welles never made a color film until other side of the wind. He was in technicaler films as an actor, but he did not direct any. I really kind of wish he had delved into it after looking at the footage, because he probably would have found new things to do with technicaler than nobody else was doing, right? And it's weird out of all out of the two people in the weird Houston Welles friendship that may or may not have committed crimes all over the Arizona area. The Houston ends up being the innovator with what technicaler can and can't do

1:02:25because he just wanted to tell Natalie Kalamaz and the board to go fuck themselves. Welles probably would have done the same thing, but with even more like crazy shit going on. Now, again, they're not really able to grab location sound. There is Benamo's description of how they grab sound effects. RKO variable area sound equipment shipped down for the occasion and operated by John Cass was used during the Prada on Zays and the symphony of the tambourine sequences. So there's a little bit of it, but not that much on the location. To realistically capture the heterophonic Esperanto of various Samba schools performing simultaneously on the Synodia sound stage. More sedate and mainstream numbers such as the Samba Conco. I hope I'm pronouncing a conco and the pattern also darling sung by Maras, NATO and Odette Amaral were recorded onto discs at the Odeon studio in Rio and performed with different actors in playback mode.

1:03:29A methodology that Welles would end up using before and after when thinking, you know what, my actor should just read the thing and then they should lipsink their performances on the stage. So then the filming gets completed in June of 1942 for the Carnival sequences and for the jungle deros. We'll move into the jungle deros. The initial idea is to shoot this in technicaler and Welles grabs first shots of it with the men arriving on the raft in tandem with their filming at Carnival. So there is technicaler footage of it. We just don't really get to see it in this documentary possibly because it's lost. This was an reenactment of the Sal Pedro's triumphant entry into Guanabara Bay. By the time this was filmed, George Schafer, the hero of Arqueo, the only person at Arqueo that matters, had informed Welles that his request to film this sequence in technicaler was denied. The original jungle deros themselves though were to still start in this piece.

1:04:29We get them into black and white cameras, still going to look great. A historical treatment for the episode is written by Ed Mar Morel, a reporter for the Deros Associados, the Associated Newspapers, a native serences who was commissioned to and who commissioned and published the travel diary of leader Jacques Array. Jacques Array's diary would serve as the primary source material for the voyage, which consisted of over 1600 miles only stopping to get food and provisions needed. It's four men on a six to eight log raft. It's crazy. It's like contiki. Very good. So, Schafer and Arqueo, per menimo, are kind of summarized as getting nervous around all these requests that Welles is asking to enhance the Brazilian shoot in tandem with their unfounded panic attacks over financial prospects of Ambersons.

1:05:29Arqueo then sent over a gentleman named Phil Reisman to inform Welles of his limits. Now, in tandem to this production manager, Lin Shor was sending negatives to Arqueo. No Lin Shor is down there for the entire shoot. Lin Shor was a racist piece of shit. Menimo states that Lin Shor had regularly sent negative reports concerning Orson's choice of shooting locations, schedules, casting of non-professional Afro-Kariocas, Black residents of Rio, and unforeseen expenditures back to Arqueo, headquarters in Hollywood, and incredibly to representatives of the Brazilian DIP. And I'm going to make a, I'm going to cite a quote that Orson said later in the Leslie Halleywell documentary for Arena. Welles basically said that he, this gentleman was sending Russia's back and sending telegrams back saying he is just shooting a bunch of jiggaboo's jumping up and down. It is the only time I've ever heard a horrible language out of Orson's mouth,

1:06:30and I'm only saying it in context because he's only saying it in context. Yes, he is replicating the voice of Lin Shor's noted racist. Yeah, no, but in very quickly, I think we need to kind of break that down a bit even further on. Yes. Because you know, the DIP, which you mentioned, which is like basically the department, the Impressionia de Propaganda, is basically Vargas' national image bureau, right? Go back. So not only is Orson at this time running a foul of Arqueo for expenditures, for how the shot's being done, now he's starting to piss off Vargas because Vargas, like inherently is not against any type of showcasing of national culture or any images. It just needs to be a curated patriotic one. And our boy, Orson, as always, has always been far more interested in human beings and marginalized societies than he is about glorifying nationalistic institutions. Let's see. Jingoism, or Junga Deros.

1:07:30Jingoism, or Junga Deros. Well, Jingoism doesn't have a cool raft. So I'm going there. You know, yeah, Vargas and Arqueo jointly want national culture promoted, again, just not from the favelas. Exactly. But our boy is out there with his little camera instead, filming the grassroots origin of Samba culture, Afro-Brazilian communities, fishermen demanding labor rights. I mean, it is starting to go severely off the rail. Everything here sounds unreasonable and un-American. And it makes me love him so much. And I will also, possibly here, it is also Orson beginning to flirt away from any sort of curated cinematic nationalism, but toward social realism, a point which I will talk about a little bit later because I think that Orson is not recognized for his contributions in this area as much. Yeah, I agree. And we're going to get to the last piece of really production information before we really start breaking down the documentary in a full, because we're going to be talking about the Junga Deros.

1:08:32But filmmaking sometimes goes into very depressing territory. Yeah. And this film is no exception. On the 19th of May, 1942, Benimo writes, shortly after Reisman's arrival, Wells and the crew are setting up for one of the takes of the Junga Deros arrival when a motor launch towing the Sal Pedro near Gava Beach when past the shooting location took a sharp turn toward the beach at Barra da Tijuca and broke the toe line of the toe link, provoking an irreparable turn in the life and welfare of the fortaleza fishing community. All four Junga Deros fell into the ocean when the Junga Deros overturned and all resurfaced, yet only Geronimo, Tata and Manuel Preto were rescued. Jocaré tried to swim ashore, but disappeared into the waves.

1:09:33Although years later, Jocaré's children still expressed a desire to see filmic evidence of their father's disappearance, there is no surviving record of this event on film. So likely they're setting up. Yes. Because if there were footage of that, I don't think it would have been tossed so readily. Perhaps. Although I have to say here, I think it's also such a catalyst moment and while you'll get into this, Wells refusal to film afterward. Right? About this is showing him putting ethics over spectacle, which I think is a very deliberate and radical political choice. Right. Now, we'll see though, Wells is quoted in the Brazilian press as saying emotion would not allow us to act. We filmed nothing. Absolutely nothing. And I am satisfied that this was so. But the project is not terminated. Benimo surmises that Reisman potentially listening to Wells's overtures realizes that pulling out would damage RKO international reputation. Now, the film kind of goes into a further thing, which as Wells said,

1:10:34when we were recalled to Brazil from Brazil, there was still some money left for shooting, not much. I took that and went up with Dick Wilson and a cameraman and we made the Jungardero documentary. And we were there two months with the Jungarderos and following their voyage and all that, it was an extraordinary experience. Richard Wilson, later interviewed in 1993, said we were cut off with 10 grand. We were given only 45,000 feet of black and white negative, 35 millimeter negative, a rented silent Mitchell camera, a cameraman who's living in Rio because of war breaking out and he couldn't be a back to hungry. Which is the ideal film job, you know. Yeah, I'll give it back to my homeland. You know, like if we fall into an issue and I end up in Canada for whatever reason. And somebody says, hey you, take your cell phone and shoot shit. I'm not going to say no. And let's also be clear, that $10,000 was really simply just an overture to Wells himself, right? That was really just like a, we're doing this just for you. Yeah, exactly.

1:11:35And because they weren't going to back up any of this other idea because Jean Glideros lived under a feudal system and Wells wanted to show that. And I don't think Arquiel or Vargas were really, particularly happy about having to do something like that. The last key note though is Wells is a storyteller. So of course, he's going to insert a needless love story into the Jean Glideros documentary. The actress that he selects for this is Francisco Morena de Silva. And she was discovered by Horsen Wells, and I love the way she says, I was discovered by Horsen Wells. I was like, yes, you were. And you're fucking awesome. He was filming on the beach on Jungada. And I went there to look. I said to my friend, what kind of setup is this? When I got home, one of them came looking for me. I came out and he said, yes, she is the one. And then he told my mother he wanted to film me. And she has 13 years old when she does this. And everything else with any other actor in the village is recorded without sound.

1:12:35And it's at this point we can start talking about four men on a raft. Yeah. Yeah. Because of Jacques Rés death, they are basically filming the rest of the three that existed. And they're keeping the fourth or Jacques Rés kind of a shrouded mystery. He's kind of like Harry Lime for the first two-thirds of the third man, right? Good. Good. Good. You know he exists and you even see hints of him. But he's not really there. But they really, I want to get your reactions on this. But I will save as an upfront. It falls into the line of Fantasia for me where I'm watching images move with a score and I am kind of hypnotized into a story where I really have to put aside my love of dialogue and really pay attention to pure cinema because that's what it is because there's no other choice of how to view it. Exactly. Because he had no script, he has no real dialogue that he's set up. He's probably going to change stuff anyway in the editing room. We're seeing an assemblage of what he was able to put together and some of it even might be just from second hand. So I wanted to get your reaction to seeing how Wells shoots this kind of a story.

1:13:40Basically months after he shot a movie about the decay of an aristocratic family. Yes. Well, let me just gush a bit about our subject here. I think it is entirely not a stretch and I hope your listeners will agree that you can make an argument for Orson Wells being perhaps the greatest innovator in cinematic history. Yeah. But maybe not your favorite filmmaker, maybe not what you would consider perhaps the most influential. But certainly the greatest innovator, this is one of the reasons why he is so important to Filmic and just general history and why he should be revered as such. It makes me think another way really quickly in praising him a bit where you can think of many different when we use the word innovator. We think of filmmakers who basically were able to radically change a component of filmmaking. Yes. So you think about something like, okay, we have editing or the montage.

1:14:40That's Eisenstein. So Eisenstein is a great innovator in this area. I would prefer that Orson Wells is an innovator of cinema in itself. We view the world and how cinema is told. The innovations do out everything through sound and camera movement and editing and lighting and deep focus. I mean, he radically changed cinema as we know it and it never went back. He is the grand innovator there. So when you ask me about this coming back is that it reminds me that he is also at the forefront in cinematic history of radically changing the idea of visual language. Right? A camera movement and visual language. So him taking away and stripping down to this minimalistic, you know, just camera work was just a reminder again of what an innovator he was. I mean, here's the thing for all you youngins out there that may watch and you're like, oh, having to go watch Citizen Kane.

1:15:40That's like being told to eat your broccoli, right? It's not exciting or fun. And what do I have to do with this old musty black and white film? Folks, look at other films just before this. Look at the way that it was head to toe, stage reaction, static camera filming and all of these films, how they looked exactly the same. And then how Orson Wells fucking wrecked it all, changed it, flipped it upside down, began innovating. The cameras doing things that had never been done before. Right. And weird. This is weird thing for me to say because one, I would be referring to one of Orson's great friends, but also this movie does innovations in a different way. But look at the multis falcon. Yeah. From the same year and then watch Kane. Houston's a first time director, but he's not the visual guy that Wells is. That's right. He's a writer guy and he's a casting guy and he changes things in different tones and languages through dialogue.

1:16:40Like I would argue that the script for a John Houston movie is probably better than an Orson well script in so many ways and shapes. Because Wells was a good writer, but it was also really a great idea man. And consequently too, I think that it's kind of interesting to see him get the same stuff he got from Kane from a camera point of view on the budget that he did. It probably helps that you're not having to like tear up the studio for. That's right. Yeah, it's funny, but it's true. Like you can dig that camera down in the sand. You can get things that you won't get. Elder, I think the difference though is that this is the rawest version of that because you're basically dealing with one camera and non actors. You have no other. That's right. We'll talk about later. Yeah, how else are you going to film this? The basic story of this tells a love story of a young man and a young girl fall in love to get married.

1:17:42They both look like they don't fit into their wedding clothes. Yeah, that $10,000 did not go to the costume budget at all. But and then that young man unfortunately dies in one of the fishing excursions. So that's when the three men who were surviving from the initial trip that was in reality. They set upon the quest with a fourth mysterious guy who's pretty basically Jogre to go out and make the journey the 1600 mile plus journey around the country to reach Rio de Janeiro to ask for their rights. Yes. And because we do have the pretext of what the jungle deros were, it helps us understand the footage at a cursory level. I thought to myself, what could you discern that without the pretext? And I think you can because of the love story weirdly enough, if it weren't for the love story, it wouldn't communicate the need for them to get on that raft and go to Rio de Janeiro to ask for rights.

1:18:51You requires the sentimentality of a widow who has lost her husband and her only means of income for a community to say we're going to take a stand. We're going to go see Vargas and knock on his big old Brazilian door and we're going to demand our rights. And so in that respect, it's kind of interesting for him to achieve something that even Hitchcock wasn't able to do, which is pure cinema on a pure scale. Now, Hitchcock was able to complete things, Wells was not afforded that privilege. So it's kind of an unfair comparison, but interesting nonetheless. So the other thing that I like about it is, there's these shots that are like, I got this note of this lower angle with the raft in the foreground. And I showed my girlfriend the documentary a couple of times, because it's kind of easy. She doesn't have to pay attention she doesn't want to. But the low angle and some of the reflection shots, I was where the things that I sounded her.

1:19:52Yeah, I was going to say that she what did she think? Yeah, she liked the footage that she saw, like she couldn't believe it was 1942, which is always what goes along with Orson Wells. It's astonishing to think that this is what's happening in this time period by this young upstart crow. Yeah, and it's just the fidelity of the footage is just remarkable. Benimo is now in charge of preserving the footage in 4k or what remains right now. I hope that means at some point we get a 4k release of this film in some form of fashion, because I think Wells was kind of built for 4k in a sense because of how he's working with deep blacks in his image quality. And how he's dealing. Yeah, and the HDR range would pick up on his shadow work exquisitely. Also, after the young man dies, we get this procession along the beaches. And it is astounding. And there's imagery of the cemetery that I really love because he uses it again in Macbeth.

1:20:54When they're going through the kind of like the more area and seeing all the different structures, he uses that similar imagery when Macbeth has finished the fight and is about to go home and then sees the witches. So he's testing out ideas here. You've seen the origins for a lot of the ideas that come to bear afterward, partially because he feels he has to recreate it because he didn't get to show it off the first time. He wants to impress people. And he doesn't want to be a one trick pony. So he doesn't necessarily want to repeat himself, right? So on top of that, I think this is one of the most human stories I've ever seen, like completed or incomplete. I think it's one thing to say that there's American films out there specifically, maybe from something like Warner Brothers, that dealt on a populous level that spoke to the issues of the common man. I think that there is a kernel of truth in that. But when you see something like Foreman on a raft, you understand how filtered down something like the stories that Xana gave to JL were.

1:22:06And it's not to dismiss them, but this is the rawst form of it. It's like the difference between bookie nights and the master. One of them is PT Anderson on a leash. The other one is when you accidentally let him go and he bites another dog in the in the yard. All right, as a bit of foreshadowing here. Yeah, that is where I think you touched upon it perfectly exactly right. It is profoundly human, right? This is a point where for Vargas, for RKO, for Welles himself, the die has been cast. It can never be our like the politics are now set firmly with this, with this short piece, right? Yeah, it is no, it's impossible to ignore the politics anymore with this. It has now gone from a patriotic story of national interest into a legacy about workers traveling to demand their rights, unions, pensions, right? He makes it fun like that. And I will argue, as you pointed out, and I'll make a stronger argument, perhaps at the end of we have time, but I think within all cinematic nerds will rightfully try to or we can rightfully agree that Rosalini is typically credited with inventing neo realism, right?

1:23:20It was primarily 1943. I will argue that Orson Welles creates proto neo realism with this. He does, and the strange part is because the footage isn't released until later. That's right. He won't get the credit. He won't get the credit. This is where I owe you a huge thanks. I said this to you before when I first saw you and immediately hugged you and thank you for bringing me on this journey again because taking from my notes, and I just like copied from my notebook as I was going down the rabbit hole revisiting this again is that, you know, you think of a Rosalini and all the tenants of generally of neo realism, right? You have as we talked about like humanism over a general plot, right? Or you know, war the natural world as a disruptor non actors and using real people in real locations. Yeah, location shooting with a working class focus. Yes, Rosalini mastered this movement initially, but my God, Zach Wells was already filming non actor fisherman fighting for labor rights on their real locations.

1:24:29He just never got a chance to finish that and what just the gift that doing this podcast and preparing for this podcast allowed me to kind of make that connective tissue again like the mother fucking innovator strikes again. Yeah, it is astonishing what he was doing here. Yeah, and he's also this is a point to where I want to start. I want to talk about Benito the bull because we didn't get to do it in full. Yeah, because the footage is so scarce, unfortunately, what we see at least. Now, I'm sure if like one of us wants to go break into UCLA, we'll find the footage and watch it together before we get put under arrest. I'm willing to do that just like the movie fanboys except. Of course, it would of course be our version. And then I'm going to and then I'll write before we're going to watch I'm going to go, what if it sucks. But the Benito, the bull sequences that we see are interesting because there's camera work in it that Foster's doing and Wells by proxy is directing it, but Foster's on the ground.

1:25:29There's shots in there that I don't see again until Sergio Leoni picks up the camera. Thank you. Thank you. That like that scene outside the church where they're going to bless the animals and the whole village coming out. I felt like I was watching a scene out of a dollar's movie. Absolutely. And it was kind of remarkable to look at that. The sad part is that I do wish we, whatever I wish it almost like I would like the head to tail of the footage. Like I'd be willing to sit with that. I know that that's not practical for the movie they ended up making in 93. But it's almost like in a world where Blu-ray features exist, special features exist, maybe show us the end end like with the Charles Lawton directs on the night of the hunter criterion. But I will say that even if it's not the most impressive footage, Benito is a story that I would have wanted to watch under Wells as guidance. Because I feel like that's a story that he's good at doing fantasy.

1:26:30If you haven't seen the trial out there, people should watch the trial because that's a fantasy movie. It just happens to be based around an autocratic regime. But, but you know, gives us flashes of that. It's flashes of the kid in worship. It's not flashes of the boy genius who scared everybody in 1938 and did a movie about William Randolph Hurston is mistress. It's about a boy animal. Yeah. And I really kind of appreciated that in juxtaposition with the Jean Glideros story because children in the Jean Glideros story are in a far different complex. One of the most profound shots in the Jean Glideros is that little girl finding the dead body. That shit is life-taming. Yeah, it's on par with seeing the girl in the red coat. Yes. In Schindler's last. Oh my goodness, easily. It's very distressing. It hurts. It hurts your heart. And watching the footage of them arriving into town has the same majesty as the angles on the beneath of the bowl where you have like a whole group of people kind of surrounding it.

1:27:40What I also love to is that Orson innovated reaction shots from Staudi people in 80s movies because there everybody's on the beach having a fun time in a real traditional all these light skinned people having a grand old time. And then suddenly I think it's Wilson's wife who's an extra takes off her sunglasses a little bit with that like little look goes what? And that's when the Jean Glideros come in. And that's where we that's where we get some kind of an 80s song to throw journey in there. I don't fucking care. But I love that reaction out of I think it's Wilson's wife. I really think it could be wrong. I'll crap myself if not. But I just love that whole thing. It's like it's the only other thing I would have wanted is Vargas going like I don't care. I'm still going to develop a mall outside of your jungle. But yeah, by the end of this though. The story that unfolds after all of this is filmed and after all of this is trying to get completed.

1:28:40Falls in tandem with the discussion we had many moons ago about the Magnificent Ambrisons in summary. Wells is basically thrown into a crosshairs with multiple there are multiple versions of how people see Orson's attitude. There are claims that Orson wasn't responding to any notes from our KO in regards to Ambrisons. Other people say that a negative is sent down of Ambrisons for him to edit to and send back all of the additions and changes. One thing is for sure, Jack Moss and others in our KO's fear are basically either intentionally doing this because they think they're helping Orson. Or could jolt into creating different footage for Ambrisons, turning the film into a more upbeat movie. There's a longer discussion we don't have to get into. But as a consequence of this.

1:29:44Red Jarmour and other people at our KO look for any and always to throw Arson off the lot. Now the key thing that they work on is finding out how best to represent what the budget is to get what they want done, which is Orson can. Versus what he actually spent on Ambrisons, which is the difference of about $100,000 roughly if not more because Wells shot efficiently on time and under budget. He always did this more for the most part, well, except for I think a few exceptions. Yeah, Kane went over a tiny bit and I think touch of evil or lady from Shanghai went over. I'm not remembering at the moment, but as a result of our KO basically throwing him out into the garbage that puts the film into a dead zone. And it's a shame on a multiple amount of reasons because the Vargas government not only doesn't want the film that Orson's making.

1:30:47They don't want Jacques Raid. So Vargas is kind of handed a gift, a sick gift. Yeah. And one of the fisherman's kids said that their father told them that this film was to be your inheritance. This film was to be your history. The exact quote is, my son after I die, this film may improve your life. And that's what we were waiting for. You know, a fisherman never leaves an inheritance. This film is the only inheritance the four craftsmen left us. And unfortunately for over 50 years, they were not able to see that. But then in 1993, the footage is assembled together. Paramount puts this out in the form of it's all true. The thing that I love is in this documentary as it exists is interviewing the children of the people who are involved. And watching how the culture that Wells wanted to shoot hadn't changed.

1:31:51And they were ready to display it in full. That sound, that song about the square that Vargas had demoed. I love how the composer's son singing along, doing music along Grand Attello, which he's that's the best name ever. And he is majestic and awesome and I want his story. But he plays on a matchbox to create a rhythm. That's right. That's right. The song and I'm like, this is worsen on a budget. This is the same thing. We're getting the same outcome. And knowing that they got to see the final results is heartening. But I kind of want to talk about this as it pertains to where we're currently at. Because I get the sense that the good neighbor policy is very much a finicky proposition by the US government. Sure. Covering. It's called cover your ass. That's what it is.

1:32:54But what's weird about it is every idea that comes out of World War II ends up being something that we really want to believe was real. And unfortunately our history hasn't always lived up to the aspirations of the mythology that World War II carries, right? What? Oh, yeah. Oh, you didn't know. We didn't get rid of the fascists. I'm sorry. What? We didn't get rid of the fascists. Long story. I have no time to get into it right now. I was not prepared for this. No, no. But trust me, it's all true. But I had a, I had this thought with the good neighbor policy that you know, it's weird because I wish that this film could get in front of more eyeballs. Not just in film circles, but in political circle. Yes. Sure. Sure. I'm thinking about like in specifics like the groups that are trying to push against this encroachment of capitalism and authoritarianism looking at this and thinking like

1:34:04what, what if we were to do the same things then that do things, same things now that they were trying to do then, which is to understand each other. And the other end of the political spectrum could benefit from that as well. It's one of the reasons why I think that what bad money did yesterday was the oddly enough, it was serendipitous. Sure. Sure. As basically a good will, a good neighbor policy video done for the Super Bowl. Everything in that you said it earlier, everything that he does in that performance is promoting South America. And he even lists all the countries so that you know what exists. It doesn't exist. Wait, a hemispheric solidarity perhaps you said? Solidarity instead of getting angry at somebody from another place, maybe we try to understand that I know this sounds like a bad idea, but hear me out.

1:35:08And so like always to say is like it makes me wonder from a good neighbor policy standpoint and from what the film was intended to be. And I'll ask you as a guy who's studied history and is more engaged on the modern front than I am in many respects. And I learned under your feet and in that respect as much as you've told me that you learn about Golden Age Hollywood under me. I learned about how to how to fight for the world I want tomorrow from you. And my question is based on the fact that we got something like we got yesterday with the Super Bowl halftime show and what something like it's all true dictates. Is there hope that something like that idea could resurface? Okay, so more about like could we re institute a form of the maybe a more positive and better intentions form of the good neighbor. I wonder if the dust were to settle tomorrow.

1:36:10Would that be a positive route to reestablish connection because it's not to say that this policy was an entire failure. South American tourism probably did boom after the war because of things like Saludo San Migos and the three Caballeros. And any other film coming out of that program. So I'm wondering if it's a possible thing that like if we were to want to get along with the world again. Would this idea help? Or is it antiquated? Yeah, I mean that okay, the the cinephile in me appreciates the optimism. The history professor in me feels the cynicism and the Muppet fan and he wants to believe it too because I'm basically asking for rainbow connection to play right now. The Muppet part of me always always believes. I mean, yeah, I mean in a weird way. I think it's kind of like the old adage that one can never make by it by the inherent nature of how you are trying to control it.

1:37:13One can never truly make an anti-war film. Think about it in those terms, I think the mere fact of what we want to represent through this policy. It can never really transpire if the adherence to cinematic truth takes prevalence, right? I mean, there was a quote I wrote down here that I think is probably now time to drop it. And that is that and I sadly I couldn't record I didn't find out who said it but it was that the problem wasn't that Wells was filming Brazil. The problem is that he was filming too much of it. And so, right, it became this idea where the simple fact of the moment that the four fishermen became humanized, became their struggle. It forever changed that it destroyed the policy of what was trying to represent at that time.

1:38:13And so I think that's kind of the point of it is that the very nature, the struggle of what you would have to do to send someone in with these intentions, the artist. A true artist has to pursue what they find and what they feel is important, right? In other words, the dismantling of power structure is the game of a true artist and certainly is the game of an artist activist like Horus. Right. Now I'll ask a question on the grounds of the notion that you just brought up, which is the good neighbor policy itself as intended is a broken artifice of what should be happening, which is telling the actual story of Brazil and not showing the things that the government just wants you to see. Sure. Right. There is a quote from one of the descendants, Pere, who was the descendant of the composer. He said they thought they would, they thought he would come here and make something pretty.

1:39:16Pictures and very superficial about Brazilian culture, only they sent the wrong man. The man who should have been sent to Brazil to do that sort of thing should have been more colorful, more Hollywood-y and mentality. Instead, they sent the greatest genius of cinema. They sent awesome wells. Oopsie. Yeah. Okay. That's a wonderful way to frame it, too, because I guess a simpler way to say this is, under such a policy or under such a directive, inherently that means collaboration. Right? That's part of it. And when you have an artist who bucks institutions and bucks authority and fights for the common people, collaboration is basically gets thrown to the wind with a true artist. So I think it could be accomplished if you're playing the game, but then at what value becomes the art? Right? And what they, I like to think of it in terms of a friend of mine who's very fond of Michael Jordan. Okay. And then the sports or two, I tend to think is a little overrated personally. However, everyone remembers like during COVID, the great documentary they came out about Michael Jordan that dominated for a while.

1:40:23Yeah, the one I took personally. Yeah, there you go. There you go. The one you did. This is why I'm bringing this up for your listeners, as I look you in the eye. But no. Well, everybody, listen to this as a big space jam fans. If you want the true story of Michael Jordan, can you achieve nuance? Can you achieve truth? In a piece of art written by Michael Jordan directed by Michael Jordan edited by Michael Jordan, Michael Jordan, right? You know, perhaps we're seeing something similar with another documentary that's in the theaters right now. You would get an objective point of view of Dennis Rodd, not Michael Jordan. That's the problem. That's right. Yes. All right. The mere fact of the intentionality behind what the desired outcome is inherently destroys the artistic endeavor. I saw I just don't know that even with best intentions that that could ever come to pass. I certainly not with a real artist of integrity. Right. Well, that's funny. I have a thought in as we're listening to you. We talk about Wells the innovator. It's weird that technology finally caught up with what Wells would have wanted to do if he was left alone in so many places.

1:41:35That's right. That's right. And one of them is, okay, I've only got 10 grand 45,000 feet of film and a Mitchell camera to work with. I now have a phone and I can take it out there to where a bunch of nonsense is happening. That's right. And I can film it. And then I can tell a story with it. And the story is look what the fuck's happening outside. And that is in a strange way. That is the, to me, the key. If we were to go back down that route, the key would be in the democratization of art. Because Wells was giving keys to the kingdom for a limited time. And Joseph McBride attest to another historian saying that Wells was an aristocrat lurking in a populist medium. More importantly though, he is an independent filmmaker that just happened to have the resources of a major studio for a time. But he was always an independent filmmaker. And now the intentions of an independent filmmaker who doesn't care who he pisses off.

1:42:38Yeah. Yeah. He can now do it today. And perhaps within a world where social media consumes more of our attention in multiple formats, stories like the raftsmen can be communicated. But that also distributed. Can they be seen? Can they be disseminated? Yes. Because again, you also have to remember lessons we talked about in a previous Wells chat about media literacy. And the added combo of what the algorithm is pushing out to you. It's not to say that what I'm saying is there's hope, but obviously there's conditions to hope, I guess. Yeah. And there's still even with the democratization of it, which I fully agree with. And I think, yeah, right? That's the great tragedy is we just when we think of our man in those latter years basically traversing European hamlets begging for money from benefactors to try to enact his vision. And yet the level of gatekeeping that studios and institutions were able to employ upon him.

1:43:39And I think that in a way that's not only so tragic, but I think that's kind of like the hopeful. I think his icon, the iconography of him and his legend and his genius lies in the things we never saw in some way. It is the absence that rings much more strongly sometimes than another person's artistic output. It's Orson's what could have been knowing him, right? And the fact is most ambitious projects routinely exceeded what studios or governments or independent finances would tolerate. And I think that's what always makes them. I think I also, I want your listeners to go away with just remembering from even this brief die we've done into this. Orson, the political revolutionary. Yes. Orson, the radical independent. And Orson, the truth teller and the artistic integrity he held at the expense of legacy.

1:44:40Yeah. Because that's to me fucking meaningful. That's what brings a tear to my eye in my adoration of him. I have another thought about it too, in tandem with that. Last time we talked about Wells, we talked about a movie that is loved by a certain person. It apparently is this person's favorite movie of all time. Something like it's all true, which then calls to mind the struggles we are currently facing on a national and international front, is further evidence that this gentleman doesn't understand the fucking movie he saw and claims to love. I think he saw a highlight reel. I think he saw a YouTube mashup of some sort. Because it's not the same movie that you and I saw and talked about for five fucking hours.

1:45:40That's right, that's right. But it also lends into it as well as a political revolutionary. From a modern standpoint, when I look at a film like this, I love that at last Wells got the last laugh. Yes. Yes. Because everything he wanted to do in those ventures, whether it was exposing the feudal system of the jungle deros, or later exposing the horrible treatment of Isaiah ordered junior, when he was beaten blind by a white man, on down to any other political cause he took, all of those fights carried an echo strong enough for the next generation to latch onto. Even if they didn't know specifically that he was beating the drum for it. Right, right, right. He sent out a vibe into the world and people like double those vibes. But also the last question we can talk about from, it's easy to talk about how this relates from a political standpoint today. Adding to the fact too, I think it's just that we are in a time right now where

1:46:44we really, really need to go back to history class and social studies and civics in order to understand why certain amounts of propaganda are bullshit and how we can learn to better tolerate neighbors and maybe also understand why they might be coming and droves into the country. And how to fix that instead of making it worse. Sure, sure. But we are film nerds, let's end on a film nerd note. We're talking about an incomplete movie. Yes, yes. The question that I have is how do we feel about this as a work of wells and not as a work of wells after the fact? Do you think that the documentary or even the footage as it's assembled is what wells might have wanted? Hmm. Hmm. See, again, I'm very torn here. I know. You know, let me just say this so you introduced it. You've taken some part of my cynical heart and just grown it several sizes a bit more

1:47:46with that idea now of trying to use art again, the democratization of equipment of our technology to try to show truth to power. Because inherently in its form, the good neighbor policy really believed, I think inherently, and earnestly at times that images that art could smooth over power and wells ironically enough by choosing the wrong or the perfect man, depending how you see it, showed that once images showcase the truth, they are no longer useful to power. And I think that's a real takeaway here, though. And that legacy that we still live with, that push and pull, as I think the policy is real legacy and how we relate to it now as artists and art as activism. So first of all, thank you for just reminding me of that. Yeah, but as far as like, wellsy and do I feel wellsy and somehow I feel it's greater in its absence

1:48:46than had we see that by only getting small glimpses, that's just a romantic in me. I think that where some people achieve immortality in the product, or some kind of for me achieves immortality in the absence. Like we mentioned, I mentioned kind of like the Ruin's analogy, his incompletion and potentiality in incompletion. And not even incompletion, I don't think that's the right word. It's in the denial of his artistic expression becomes a form of authorship for me. It's like I live in the gaps of what could have been knowing what he wanted. It's kind of like a wellsy and negative space of honor. I guess I don't know. That's romantic for me to be in, right? So I also jotted this down that I came across. It's all true in a sense might be wells purest film, precisely because the studio never got to finish domesticating it.

1:49:46And I like to think of it in that sense of the romanticized version of this. Yeah, because he compromised even in K. That's right. And with touch of evil, you read the memo, he was willing to concede stuff. He wasn't like an immovable rock. That's what I'm saying, right? Yeah, this was pure in the sense it never got domesticated. And like some of it's like, like it's subject. Yes. Found itself at the bottom of the ocean, right? All these reels, things that were dumped. Think about that. I mean, that's, yeah, that's incredible. And I think that something that I find, I think for me, I live in those in between two. Yeah. Like when I saw a Phoenician scheme last year, I'm like, this is what our cotton was supposed to be. Yes. It was supposed to be this. Like Wes Anderson basically made a remake of our cotton. And he did it right. And this is what it would be. Agreed.

1:50:46If fucking people left him alone and just gave him a pile of money. And I know that that sounds ignorant from a business standpoint. And I understand this is the film business. But Wells is the one filmmaker who when I look at what we could have gotten, it is hard for me to have sympathy for a being counter. Yes, not exactly. Exactly. And it's not a disrespect to the people who work their asses off in the film industry trying to make art happen under corporate boards. It's just that he's the one filmmaker who rises up the flames for me. Yes, yes, yes. And I think that in terms of this being a Wellesian film, I thought about this as I think what's interesting is that. It is in the respect that. Welles loved editing. Wells really loved editing. And this is a film that it thrives on editing by the mere fact of how it exists. Not what exists, but how it exists. And F for fake is a good testament to that ability too.

1:51:46Right. Take whatever footage I wanted. I'm going to reassemble it in the movie. Hold it and work in my magic on it that way. And I think that it's all true falls in that camp. There's traditional stuff in it. There's talking head interviews. Of course. But it's also interspersed with the music and the culture that he wanted to represent. And so like it's almost like looking at a film that Wells made in the vein of filming a fellow or filming the trial. Where I'm going to talk about the making of this film. I'm going to show you footage from this film, but I'm also going to have a discussion about what the film was. And this is kind of the closest we'll get to that kind of series. And these forms of documentary filmmaking that he was exploring later in his life. In terms of that legacy of incomplete films. Simon Cowell. Simon Cowell does not. Seems to not think that. Other side of the wind should have been finished. Because it wasn't completed by him. There is a school of thought that since Wells himself is not one finishing to cut himself and two benefiting from that.

1:52:51That it's incomplete and it will always be incomplete. I think I have come under the impression since the other side of the wind came out that within reason. I do think that assembling these in some fashion is necessary. Because if it's all true was left in that vault. We wouldn't have an example of a world of inequality. And deep racism that came from a country where our only knowledge of it growing up as children is the carnival. And not what built the carnival. Yes. And the fact that the fact that that is a portion of the film's legacy speaks to why we need to see it. Because it's harder at that point for somebody to whitewash history.

1:53:52The more filmic evidence you provide. The harder it is to say, well, that never really happened. And everybody agreed that slavery was a good thing at that time. And there was about states' rights. And after World War II fascism disappeared forever. You need this shit to be out there. To give you a reminder that nothing changed. Because we haven't really reckoned with anything. This goes back to a conversation that you and I had way back in family. We are the only country that never reckoned with our history. Because we kept winning wars. And even when we lost wars, we refused to accept it. We haven't reckoned with that legacy. Wells found another country that needed to reckon with itself. And God has documentary proof of it. And what's sad is we almost kept up with the Joneses in that respect.

1:54:54Because we didn't want to show that diversity either. And it's sad. But it gives me the hope that if more footage is found from this, I want to see more of it. I want to see more of the history that I was deprived of in school. I want to see more of the history that I'm being deprived of in a world that constantly wants to erase our history, whether it's pop culture or otherwise. More importantly, though, I just want to watch it because I am a fan of Morrison. And I want to just watch good filmmaking. And it's sad that the studio system being what it is right now, projects like restoring Wells's work are not going to be at top of mind. And unfortunately, some of them are reached to the point where they're saying, well, I'm just going to use AI to cut in between the lines. Because I'm too desperate to see what Emerson's would have been. I'm in a similar boat with Emerson's after that recent news of people wanting to use generative AI for it. My viewpoint is, well, we have what we have.

1:55:55And I don't want to pretend about what it could have been. And the difference between this and other side of the wind, is that other side of the wind has all of it. None of it is generative AI. It is all footage he shot. Right. The only thing that he did not direct was Peter Bogdanovich doing the narration at the beginning of Jake Hennifer. That's the car that was in the accident. And with it's all true, I don't know what this movie would have been without the demo, without it going lost time. But I'm kind of glad now in retrospect that it exists the way it does because it's, because as you said, it's unfiltered. And it's also triumphant. Oh, my God. It turns, it turns the common man. Yes. In any class into the hero that they deserve to be. And that's an amazing thought. And it's an amazing gift well left behind for us to talk about. This is a fantastic chat, buddy. I really encourage people when this episode goes up,

1:56:57go over to the website to look at the notes that are in fuller detail to tell the story. More importantly, pick up Catherine Benemose. Yes, yes. I know we will. We absolutely will have a book date after this. We should live a value book. You have our first one. You have over 300 pages worth of content, her dissecting this whole production and endeavor. And hope to God. So, you know, I made fun of Paramount earlier, but I'll make a pitch. Oh, David. You and your father never give me what I really want. But the only Christmas gift that I want, other than a fat goose in the window, is the 4K footage of, it's all true. But no, thank you so much, buddy. This is fantastic. No, thank you. And please remind people where they can find you for more discussions like this, or where they can find you in the film community at large to promote the future of cinema. Oh, absolutely.

1:57:57And again, I just want to thank not only you for having me on, as usual, there's no one. I'd rather talk about cinema or life or politics or activism. You managed through this talk to, again, bring me back. And I'll say this is a final piece on the way out, too, is that so much of us, part of the mythology of Orson Welles, is framed by loss. Right? It's framed by, you know, lost cuts, lost control. Loss of his mother and father at a young age. Everything by loss, right? And what I love about this is you have actually buoyed me by making me think in terms of, I want to view it more as, like you said, a triumphant taking back that power from studios, from systems, from gatekeepers, from the money. Yeah. And bring it back and realize it's not so much loss with this, but really the mythology of Orson is that his truth and his art and his passion and his dignity of his subjects escaped. Yep. Through this viewing through the fragments we have, it escapes what it was meant to be, or how it was meant to be domesticated,

1:58:59and is there to provide this, this humanistic and proto-social realistic experience. Yeah. With that, of course, leaving me on that hope. I need that right now, buddy. And I think the world needs it. We all hold it. We all kind of need that. So thank you. Yes. You can find Zach and I actually piling around in a number of projects that we, you know, again, because if we're not just down the rabbit holes for hours discussing Orson Wells, we have other fun projects we do. One of them is the Real Horrors Short Film Festival, which was launched last year, that we are both a part of, and we are back for our second year. It's going to be with Colorado Festival of Horror. Yep. So if you love short films, you love horror as a genre like we also do, as a sub-genre, you can find us there hanging around. And I would urge you to go visit Colorado Festival of Horror's website for that. I have a site, should you want to hear any of my blow-viations and I don't know why you would, that's a Hanley on Film.com. And I also write under the medium platform,

1:59:59a site called Kinephilia, which I also write there. And then last, let me just make a pitch for another project I have. I do my own podcast called Blind Spotting, Film Discovery Podcast, which Zach has been a guest on and our last very last episode. The reckless moment. The reckless moment, which we talked about. And that is a film project with a friend of both of our Scott Agner, who is also deeply involved in many of these other projects. And he and I, it's a long-distance project where we look at films that over the years, and we both program for festivals and like you with your podcast, think of all the films we watch all the time. So it's almost astonishing to think there could be a blind spot every now and then, but we try to discover films that escaped our filmic education. We watch them together and have a chat about rediscovering old cinema. And I urge you all, leave your listeners out there. First of all, find someone important to you in your life, like I have for Zach or Scott or all the other collaborators we have. Go out and seek beautiful pieces of art together. Watch it together.

2:00:59And my God, discuss it together and it'll radically change your life. Agreed. And I, on the reckless moment too, that is one of the most interesting... What a... Interesting films I've ever been exposed to. Right? I really like, in another world, it would have been like a weird comedy about how James Mason learns to be a good guy. He's just a hoodlum, but then Joan Bennett just teaches him how to be like a human, domesticated human. It's weird. It's a great movie, though. It's a whole show. Speaking of origin, do like some film that I kept looking at going, how could this be from this time period? Yeah. The shots are so revolutionary. It's really interesting. Oh, yeah. And it's noir. Like, it's tiptoeing into noir mixed with Douglassurk. It's a great film. Go check it out. Because then you can also hear Zach talk about it as well. And then it's blind spotting a film discovery podcast everywhere you find your favorite podcast. Wonderful. Thank you so much, buddy. Thank you to your listeners for tolerating me every time to come on the show. I've wanted you back for this, and I want you back again. We needed to find another product, another film to deep dive into.

2:02:00Because I enjoy these shots. And the reason I picked you for this film is because the activist nature of this movie that I saw from when I first saw it, I was like, there's only one person I want to get in on this discussion right now. Because I know I would be talking to a well-educated man about it. And somebody who can hopefully inspire other listeners out there to understand the power of what well is innovated, not just with the camera, but with the power of the voice. And the only thing that I can leave viewer listeners on is, first of all, we're not, obviously, we're going to keep continuing the podcast. This isn't the end, I swear. But coming up on the program, I'm hopefully going to be talking again with Zoe Caparonis. So we're going to cover the film holiday from 1938. So that'd be a lot of fun. And then I'm going to bring Craig Shemman back. No muppet talk this time. We're going to talk about one, two, three by Billy Wilder. The film that James Cagney did a huge monologue in and said, I'm done with acting. Until somebody makes a movie called ragged. And then, of course, please check out the series of War of Mondial. We're Rashmi Manon and I are going through the wide world of film noir.

2:03:02Thank you all for listening, folks. I'm going to leave you with a quote by our dear lovely Orson that is set at the end of this documentary, which is, Of course, we all live with our past, but I try not to encourage it to misbehaving. With all due respect to Orson, thank you for misbehaving. Have a good night, folks. This concludes tonight's episode of Yesteryear Valley Who Review. Remember, you can follow us on Instagram and Threads under the handle at Valley Who Review Pod. And now I'm Blue Sky under the handle at valleywhoreview.bsky.social.

2:04:06Be sure to check out our sister series, YBR Presents, where we narrow in on certain topics ranging from Jacques Tatis all the way to international noir film. Our theme was composed by Maddie Ghost and our announcer was Henry Jarvis. Thanks for listening. Now stay tuned for Jack Benny, who follows immediately after station identification. Thank you.