Dir: Orson Welles | Cast: Orson Welles, Edward G Robinson, Loretta Young | US Noir
Long before he met David Lean, Sam Spiegel in his S. P. Eagle days was already signing the cheques for Orson Welles.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that after a promising start Welles quickly sank into a dispiriting morass of inferior films; however, films like ‘The Stranger’ and ‘The Lady from Shanghai’ would on their own have been the cornerstone of any lesser director’s reputation.
Reunited with the production designer of ‘Citizen Kane’ and teamed for the first with Russell Metty (long before ‘Touch of Evil’ and the films of Douglas Sirk whose wintry small town in ‘All That Heaven Allows’ this resembles), this probably represents one of Hollywood’s great anti-fascist films.@RichardChatten