Classic Movies: The Story of The Third Man on Sky Arts

 

The first in a brand new series on Sky Arts. These are in depth reviews of classic films, one for each episode. A 3DD Production in association with Sky Arts 6x60'. These are the same production companies who brought us series such as "The Directors" and "Great Film Composers" that are all reviewed on this blog. Their series "Art of Film" comes in October. And the same presenters are also here, this time Ian Nathan takes the main presenting role with contributions from Stephen Armstrong, Neil Norman and Derek Malcolm. The latter appears in his own garden talking to Ian Nathan. I think Derek must have been ninety when this was filmed and, sad to say, he died the following year. There is a great obituary on the Guardian website.

There are some excellent anecdotes of what happened behind the scenes of The Third Man. It was the novel's author, Graham Greene, who adapted his novel for the screenplay. Alexander Korda was the producer but it was David O Selznick back in Hollywood who tried to pull the strings. All to no avail as director Carol Reed made the film he wanted. Thank goodness. Selznick cut the American release. Angela Allen was the script supervisor on the film and here she is talking to Ian Nathan about the shooting of the picture and how the bombed out city of Vienna looked just after the war. 

I loved the way Ian Nathan was filmed in colour walking those same streets in present day Vienna , comparing the same locations shot in black and white. We see the stars of the film, Orson Welles of course, Joseph Cotton, Trevor Howard and Bernard Lee (before he became "M" in the early James Bond films). It's Neil Norman who proclaims Welles' has "one of the great entrances of any film" while Ian Nathan goes further with "in all of film history". Those first facial expressions of Welles shows what a top actor he was. Of course much is revealed about the music and the zither playing of Anton Karas. A highly influential film.