A. davies Filming Shakespeares Plays Othello, Orson Welles:For the first time in this examination of specific Shakespearean films, we are faced with a film which aims at reconciling theatrical drama with the realism of non-theatrical spatial elements. The text and even the plot of the original were incidental to the dark and delirious passions enclosed in its tormented theme' and that Welles's interest is primarily in 'the current of hate and villainy' (cited at 100)'not a duplication, not a parallel, but a re-creation in cinematic terms, inspired by those emotions and images in the original to which the artist has responded'. (cited at 101)-the shots mosaic, cubist fragmentation this film challenges the specifically narrative nature of cinema.There is no doubt that Welles's intention is to move away from the conventional narrative flow to dissect dramatic action, and there is no doubt either that when Eric Bentley complains that Welles 'shows no sense of narrative, that is, of the procession of incidents, but only an interest in the incidents themselves no, not even that, but only an interest in separate moments within the incidents' he has acutely, if inadvertently, identified the film's intention. Unlike Olivier, whose objective is to make Shakespeare accessible in a narrative sweep to audiences with perhaps only the most naive knowledge of the play, Welles addresses his O T H E L L O to an audience whose familiarity with the plot, if not the text of the play, is assumed. (102)Welles's film is a gallery of distinct visual memories presented in a very tight temporal structure and rhythm, but related also (because of their impact) to time outside the duration of the immediate visual encounter. (103)The nature of this relationship which Welles establishes between dramatic movement and time - between a flashed image and later contemplation - is in some respects the kind of relationship which Shakespeare's language accomplishes through the presentation of an artistic poetic image, which necessitating an aesthetic response, halts both the poetic and dramatic flow of the play's action. Bazin: 'the major achievement of Welles's adaptation .. . [is that] it is profoundly faithful to Shakespeare's dramatic poetry'. (103)This shift away from the narrative mode is evident in the prologues of both MACBETH and OTHELLO, for what distinguishes these from Olivier's HAMLET is the relation of the visuals to the spoken words. (103)The pace and 'cascade' of images suggest a 'stream-of-consciousness' rather than a narrative mode. (105)Just as Knight sees the reduction of Othello's language from poetic grandeur and simplicity to vicious, fragmented, a-rhythmic crudity wrought by Iago's infection of the Othello world-view, so Jorgens sees the compositional styles of Welles's film as being divided into two specific categories: the 'Othello style' whose features are simplicity, grandeur and hyperbole, and the 'Iago style' which infects the film's imagery with its 'dizzying perspectives, tortured compositions, grotesque shadows, [and] mad distortions'. (106)-Welless interest in The Heart of darkness he writes a script for it. The fruitful area of overlap between Conrad's The Heart of Darkness and Welles's film OTHELLO is that area which explores the relationship of individual man and his moral confidence to established cultural order, and the importance of architectural style in Welles's OTHELLO lies in the recognition that architecture is the manifestation of culture. (107)-Venice vs. Mogador: Group leadership by white-haired civilians is replaced by the individual generalship of Othello... Glassy canals are replaced by vicious seas which pound at the battlements. And the longer we are in Cyprus, the more the involuted Iago style triumphs over the lyric, heroic Othello style. (cited at 107)-the labyrinth, more and more present: 'We move inside the labyrinthine bowels of the fortress, into vaulted halls, long staircases, sewers where the deceptively placid water mirrors endless arches, and the Turkish bath where the sweat and steam lead to a crescendo of rushing water at Roderigo's death. (cited at 108)

Macbeth:Welles's film inevitably reduces this dramatic intensity by limiting Macbeth's options, and by giving the witches a manipulative ascendancy, their power over Macbeth being visually established early in the film when they are depicted with a small crowned effigy at their feet. (83)-the Holy Father new character introduced by Welles an unsuccessful attempt tokeep the Christian dimension of the drama The architectural structuring of their settings is used to externalize psychological complexities, and the borderline between the conscious and subconscious worlds of the heroes is the major preoccupation of cinematic exploration. Both films [Welless Macbeth and Oliviers Hamlet] exploit the stark contrasts of monochromatic film to present dramas of light and darkness. (84)-the content of the film serves as little more than an obvious vehicle for... expressive form. Welles's real statement was contained in his violent imagery. Thus the actor became simply another facet of the imagery. (86)-expressionism: Of the typical features of classic expressionism which are especially relevant to the MACBETH style are the isolation of the individual, the sense of endless simultaneity and disintegration, the obsession with death, and the vertiginous angularity of both the camera's shooting angles and of the line within the frame. (86)- the essence of the film's thematic conflict is to be that of 'form' against 'formlessness (87)-Joseph MacBride Welles Macbeth 'evokes less a struggle of the will for dominance than the struggle of the mind for consciousness. The change in him [Macbeth] after the murder is almost indistinguishable; he seems to be sleepwalking from the beginning, and his blindness to the possibility of free choice makes it difficult for us to consider him a tragic hero. (88)-affinities with horror movies and film noir.-Jean Cocteau: Coiffed with homs and crowns of cardboard, clad in animal skins like the first motorists, the heroes of the drama move in the corridors of a kind of dream underground, in devastated caves leaking water, in an abandoned coal-mine . . . At times we ask ourselves in what age this nightmare is taking place, and when we encounter Lady Macbeth for the first time before the camera moves back and places her, we almost see a lady in modern dress lying on a fur couch next to the telephone. (88) Welles's refusal to locate the spatial detail of the costume and decor in space or time gives the film the power of the dream vision; shape without form, presence without rational interpretation and without relative place in the world of conscious perspective. (89) dream: dissolvation of the moral polarities see the confusion of the 'fair/foul' dichotomy + not only a-historical, but a-moral (Bazin) a prehistory of the conscience at the birth of time and sin, when sky and earth, water and fire, good and evil, still aren't distinctly separate'.the film has about it a surprising spatial ambivalence. On the one hand, the rapid succession of montaged perspectives is imposed upon the perception of the viewer, while on the other, the camera's agility affords a sense of omni-directional vision.[...] Its revelations [the cameras] of quick moments of action operate upon the world of the film like flashes of lightning which create visual essence as they reveal it, and as such, the camera assumes the stature of a cosmic force. (94)-Light and darkness: As so often in Welles's work, light is seen as a purifying element. Macbeth and his wife hatch their plans in semi-darkness (her 'Come, thick night!' is given visible form); there is an emphasis on the blackness of the branches from which Macbeth's men unsaddle the doomed Banquo. As Macbeth gasps, 'Is this a dagger which I see before me?' the images grow blurred, become suffused with gloom ... Only at the end, with Macbeth decapitated after a fierce struggle on the battlements, does light assert its strength and honesty as hundreds of torches are brandished in the acknowledgement of Scotland's new king (quoted at 95)