Uh-oh, it looks like your Internet Explorer is out of date.
For a better shopping experience, please upgrade now.
Narrated by Keith Szarabajka
Josh KarpUnabridged — 8 hours, 24 minutes
Narrated by Keith Szarabajka
Josh KarpUnabridged — 8 hours, 24 minutes
In the summer of 1970, legendary but self-destructive director Orson Welles returned to Hollywood from years of self-imposed exile in Europe and decided it was time to make a comeback movie. It was about a legendary self-destructive director who returns to Hollywood from years of self-imposed exile in Europe. Welles swore it wasn't autobiographical.
The Other Side of the Wind was supposed to take place during a single day, and Welles planned to shoot it in eight weeks. It took twelve years and remains unreleased and largely unseen.
Orson Welles's Last Movie by Josh Karp is a fast-paced, behind-the-scenes account of the bizarre, hilarious, and remarkable making of what has been called “the greatest home movie that no one has ever seen.” Funded by the shah of Iran's brother-in-law and based on a script that Welles rewrote every night for years, it was a final attempt to one-up his own best work. It's almost impossible to tell if art is imitating life or vice versa in the film. It's a production best encompassed by its star, John Huston, who described the making of the film as “an adventure shared by desperate men that finally came to nothing.”
…Josh Karp applies enthusiastic scholarship, with vivid narrative writing and just the right touch of can-you-believe-this-stuff? marvel, to chronicle what did and didn't happen, and why. The extensive endnotes and bibliography are reassuring, considering the boost Karp gets out of recreating historically important dialogue—and even offhand comments—among real people.
02/16/2015
Orson Welles (1915–1985), one of cinema’s most acclaimed—and eccentric—actors and directors, spent the last 15 years of his life feverishly working on a film he never completed, a frenetic journey that Karp (Straight Down the Middle) chronicles in this informative but at times overly dense account of art and madness. Like Charles Foster Kane in Citizen Kane, the film that made Welles famous at age 25, Welles was larger than life in every way. Given the very rare honor of editing the final cut of Kane, he expected such control for the rest of his career and, sadly, never received it, prompting him to leave Hollywood for Europe. In 1970, eager for a comeback—this was the era of “New Hollywood,” led by films like Bonnie and Clyde—Welles arrived with an idea for The Other Side of the Wind, a film centered on an aging director (eventually played by longtime friend John Huston) trying to stage his own comeback; there would be a film within a film. He always strenuously objected to any claims that it was autobiographical. Filmed on locations over the course of years, Welles never shared the script with any of his actors, preferring instead to guide them through long Altman-style improvisations. The funding crises were constant—Welles could not manage money—and to this day the film remains unedited and unreleased, mired in legal battles that include a French vault and the Shah of Iran’s brother-in-law. Karp often gets overly caught up in the minutiae, but his adoration for Welles is obvious, and readers can only hope Wind will one day reach screens. (Apr.)
"A dynamic account of the film’s making and eventual undoing."—The New Yorker
"Supremely entertaining ...[and]... an early contender for this year's best book about Hollywood."—Hollywood Reporter
"Fascinating...an in-depth account. [A] wonderful book." —The Wall Street Journal
"Meticulously researched."—Washington Post
"Excellent...this tale of the ultimate movie gone wrong could make for a pretty wonderful movie." -Entertainment Weekly
"Karp applies enthusiastic scholarship, with vivid narrative writing and just the right touch of can-you-believe-this-stuff? marvel." - New York Times Book Review
"Propulsive..." - New York Magazine
"A unique and compelling book."—Winnipeg Free Press
★ 03/01/2015
The last 12 years of actor/director Orson Welles's life (1915–85) were spent trying to complete his final film, The Other Side of the Wind, and like many of his later projects, the endeavor was crippled by financial difficulties. The process and the personalities involved have become a legend unto themselves, and journalist/professor (Northwestern Univ.) Karp's conversational tone yet unerring attention to detail make this an essential book on Welles. For while the majority of accounts about the man try to cover his entire career, or consist of critical analyses, Karp has gathered the stories of the surviving members of the cast and crew and coupled them with scrupulous research to paint an intimate, humorous, and staggering tale of one of the great creative minds of cinema and his attempt to simply do what he did best. VERDICT This is easily one of the most enjoyable and informative books about Welles ever published, and the timing couldn't be better, as producers have announced plans to finally release The Other Side of the Wind this year, the centenary of the actor and director's birth.—Peter Thornell, Hingham P.L., MA
★ 2015-01-15
What became of The Other Side of the Wind, that crazy movie that took up the last 15 years of the life of Orson Welles (1915-1985)?Karp (A Futile and Stupid Gesture: How Doug Kenney and National Lampoon Changed Comedy Forever, 2006, etc.) puts that question to rest with this hilarious and sobering saga of one of the greatest films never finished. Almost from its official start in 1970, the last project by Welles was a shape-shifting obsession, rumored as much for its alleged uniqueness as for its constant and (so far) permanent delay. On the surface, it sounds exciting: an 8½ -style story of a troubled director (played by John Huston) trying to finish a movie; a neo-Godard-ian narrative, shot in a variety of formats; a seemingly Cubist editing style, "reducing each take into little bits of film and then creating a new continuity within each scene." It was meant to be both spontaneously brilliant and efficient, proof that the famously "troublesome" director could deliver a film on time and under budget. Instead, shooting ballooned from weeks to years upon years, during which it was cast and recast, shot and reshot, edited and re-edited; people were routinely hired, fired and rehired as they watched their careers consumed in the process. After the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the incomplete film—partly financed by the shah of Iran's brother-in-law—officially entered purgatory. Ever since then, family, heirs and financiers have been fighting for control. Luckily, there's nothing unfinished in Karp's retelling. He follows every story, dollar and last legal battle in full detail. Whether the film sees a 2015 release on the anniversary of Welles' birth, as was speculated as of late last year, we at least have Karp to thank for the next best thing.
| BN ID: | 2940169689105 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Blackstone Audio, Inc. |
| Publication date: | 06/16/2015 |
| Edition description: | Unabridged |
