Review of Me and Orson Welles (2008) by Blah B — 13 Dec 2009

After the blast of imagination that was A Scanner Darkly, Linklater has been gone back down a more subtle path, but that's not quite a bad thing. While basic in execution, the film's ensemble is beyond fantastic, particularly Christian McKay. Even though he's 13 years older than Welles was at the time period, and he's British, he somehow provides a very astute portrayal. You ignore his age gap and occasional accent drops due to his determination in portraying the man who's arrogance and bravado was both his strength and his absolute weakness. When you see him, it's almost like watching a biography at times.

Zac Efron shows a lot more maturity than his other films, and provides plenty of laughs without overt snarkiness, but is second-billing in comparison to McKay. The rest of the cast is good, with Danes probably being the weakest. It's also nice to see an appearance from the frequently overlooked Eddie Marsan, who provided one of the best performances of 2008 in Happy Go Lucky.