Review of Me and Orson Welles (2008) by Parker M — 20 Sep 2010

3.5 Stars out of 4.

If you asked me what a movie called Me and Orson Welles would be like, I wouldn't predict this. I would speculate a biopic, about one's observations maybe around the production of Citizen Kane (which Welles completed at the age of 25). Me and Orson Welles is done, directed by Richard Linklater (A Scanner Darkly), is done on a scale poles apart from our expectations. It's relatively modest, told under thespian realism, and jaunty and fleecy, not epical and grandiose.

Yet the film still answers our questions and anticipations. And more so. It creates a fascinating angle between watcher-performer by telling the story though the point of view of a young aspirer, who witnesses Welles's pugnacious, yet wildly shrewd ego. Me and Orson Welles forms itself under a narrative, but it never restrains itself from the backstage drama.

Richard Samuels (Zac Efron) is an actor, he likes to think. He meets Gretta (Zoe Kazan), a writer, she thinks. This is a story about a pipe dream, the what ifs, the wishes of becoming that vitalized art icon. That dream is transpired when Richard runs into Orson Welles, who is looking for an actor who can play a mean instrument. Richard, as all successful artists do, lies to get his role. Orson (the brilliant newbie Christian McKay) hires him by sneering to his associates: "quiet I'm negotiating." Only he could get away with that.

Me and Orson Welles, I noticed, is a football movie. It begins with making the team, practicing for perfection, and then ultimately having the big game at the end ? the play production. Linklater is dealing with formula, but he never succumbs to melodrama. Richard, casted as Lucius in Welles' production of Caesar, finds himself under the flirtations of the vivacious Sonja Jones (Claire Danes). Linklater spares the sap and creates a motive behind this relationship ? nothing is as real as you'd think; remember this is theatre.

Welles, as genius and adroit as he was, was still a messy director. He directed his masterpieces from catastrophe-up. At one moment, the theatre manager, John Houseman (Eddie Marsan), will be castigating Welles for his lack of organization, next thing Welles is having an affair with one of the actresses, and then ordering one of his actors to raise the voice a little. This guy multitasked to the extent you'd expect his tongue to get swollen or his brain to fry. What is terrific about Me and Orson Welles is its startling lack of omniscience.

The film is not a character study, yet we obtain so much information on this maniacal auteur that we still feel like we've endured this production with him. It's a story on a Citizen Kane, from his wife's perspective if you will. Me and Orson Welles, metaphorically, is a deep-focus shot. Welles seems to be always extrapolated from the narrative, distant from the narrative, but this allows us to breach him. Because Welles does not dictate the story, it defines him. When he behaves in a certain way, we speculate ? 'that's not like Mr. Welles.' It is fascinating what Linklater is doing here. Making us comprehend a character, without us explicitly knowing it.

Why? Because Efron is adequate in his role ? when he sings your mind does not register High School Musical and when he acts you do not recollect on the sanctimonious 17 Again. The film establishes its time period well, but doesn't hammer that in with passé vernacular it vitalizes the essence of theatre, the struggles, betrayals, and triumphs that occur within.

And most importantly, this is a very fun film that holds your interest and never lets go. When the ending arrives, it is necessarily fitting because it reaches out to the audience and is honest about the irony of life. When success comes, failure will follow, and then success will supersede again. It's Linklater's words of wisdom, and his embodiment of Welles is parallel to how Welles, paradoxically entitled himself: "an unfortunate personality.".