Author Joseph Cotten (Holly) is invited to Vienna by his friend Orson Welles (Harry Lime). There is a major problem with this set-up from the outset as it is revealed that Welles has just been killed. Cotton attends the burial but sticks around in Vienna as there seems to be a great deal of suspicion surrounding the death of his buddy.
The film has an interesting setting and idea for a story but I'm afraid that it just drags - it's drawn-out and never gets moving. Cotten is dreary in the lead role but Welles is the best thing in the film and delivers his amusing famous quote comparing Italy with Switzerland. The scene on the Ferris wheel is a standout scene as the audience experiences the only real moment of tension as the carriage door is opened at the top of the ride. Uh-oh – is anybody going over the edge?
A mention must be made of the music – it's all zithery throughout. To further clarify, it sounds like a mixture between Greek music and French café accordion music. And it provides moments of over-exaggerated melodrama that just ends up comical. It is also just basically out-of-place belonging more in an art film or 1960s camp comedy horror.
The story is not bad and the film could have been so much more interesting – we are given about 30 minutes of plot stretched out to nearly 2 hours. Definitely not the classic that everyone blindly labels it as – it is vastly over-rated right up to the final chase scene in the sewers – a plot device that was done a year before in the better film "He Walked By Night" (1948) which provided far more tension and a better sewer chase.
The film has an interesting setting and idea for a story but I'm afraid that it just drags - it's drawn-out and never gets moving. Cotten is dreary in the lead role but Welles is the best thing in the film and delivers his amusing famous quote comparing Italy with Switzerland. The scene on the Ferris wheel is a standout scene as the audience experiences the only real moment of tension as the carriage door is opened at the top of the ride. Uh-oh – is anybody going over the edge?
A mention must be made of the music – it's all zithery throughout. To further clarify, it sounds like a mixture between Greek music and French café accordion music. And it provides moments of over-exaggerated melodrama that just ends up comical. It is also just basically out-of-place belonging more in an art film or 1960s camp comedy horror.
The story is not bad and the film could have been so much more interesting – we are given about 30 minutes of plot stretched out to nearly 2 hours. Definitely not the classic that everyone blindly labels it as – it is vastly over-rated right up to the final chase scene in the sewers – a plot device that was done a year before in the better film "He Walked By Night" (1948) which provided far more tension and a better sewer chase.