Good start, but then it gets ruined

From my favorite movies..

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Blistering performances.

Up front I think it's fair to admit that I have not read the plays Shakespeare wrote that provide the basis of this film and it's screenplay.I've read Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth and Julius Ceaser and I'm blessed that my public education provided me that much. But when it comes to Henry the IV, V, or VI I'm pretty much in the dark.Chimes of Midnight did not leave me in the dark however. Orson Welles, I think, did a wonderful job of translating Shakespeaian dialogue into action that could be understood, jokes that could be understood, dramatic tension that could be understood.Not only do i realize I am 400 years removed from Shakespeare but I am also 53 years removed from whatever audience Orson Welles intended this for in in 1965.But I don't feel removed from the artistry that it took to make this film.I could follow the plot, I knew where characters were emotionally, and even better, I understood the jokes. Which, for me, was a huge windfall and a source of amazement.Orson Welles was dead before I was even born and I find him totally captivating and engaging in this film. He's lovable, he's a rapscallion, he's larger than life and he breaks your heart when he's denied by the newly crowned king.I'm coming to this as an outsider. I loved Citizen Kane and Touch of Evil, I immensely enjoyed F is for Fake, and I've been looking to engage in more films starring or directed by Orson Welles, and I walked away from this film feeling like it filled a gap.Here was his passion for gorgeous cinematography, here was his love of the stage, here was his brilliance at translating plays, here was his love for acting here was his passion for entertainment.At no point did this film drag for me, and even now, in 2017 did the battle scene not only engage, but surprise me. This IS masterclass film making and this film deserved a wider audience back in 1965 and it deserves it still today.Absolutely riveting and amazing work.

It's not exactly daring to declare Citizen Kane to be Orson Welles's most groundbreaking and influential movie. That does not, however, mean that Kane is necessarily Welles's most entertaining and satisfying film. I have long held the latter to be Touch of Evil, but now that I have seen the long unavailable Chimes at Midnight, I might have to reconsider. Welles is indisputably the primary creative force behind Kane and Touch. With Chimes he had some pretty decent source material with which to start. The script is composed of scenes from Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor, Henry IV Parts 1 & 2, and Henry V reconfigured to make Falstaff, Shakespeare's most famous supporting character, into the primary figure of the narrative. But this creates an entirely original story with entirely different themes and politics than those of the original works. This is one of the most contemporary feeling Shakespeare films ever made, even though it in no way departs from the plays' medieval settings. Indeed, the magnificent art direction subtly but powerfully conveys a world of spectacular barbarity where even the most sympathetic characters wander an earth littered with tortured, mutilated, broken bodies displaying not a trace of emotion. There is so much understandable attention paid to Welles the director that we sometimes overlook what a truly gifted actor the man was. And in that regard, this is his masterpiece, the performance of his life . His Falstaff is a soulful hedonist whose gift for gab can make most anyone forgive his rather parasitic nature. This is not the likable, but sometimes violent criminal the character is sometimes imagined to be, but a man who wants his stories to amuse and make one forget or overlook the characters intense vulnerability, and indeed cowardice. Welles always conveys vulnerability, even in his least sympathetic characters, but this is a spectacularly moving performance in which the old Welles uses his physical awkwardness, his jarring girth, to manifest a man who tries to entertain a world he cannot change, or even nimbly navigate. Falstaff is a moving character as written in Shakespeare's three plays that feature Henry V. Yet those plays are ultimately, necessarily, celebrations of feudal power and conquest. The young Henry enjoys the rapscalrony of Falstaff's company, but when the time comes to assume power, he dutifully puts aside childish things and starts a war of conquest for the glory of the nation, which is to say the Crown. Falstaff is, in these plays, that which must be repudiated for the sake of glory. Nothing in this twentieth century work makes feudal power seem glorious. When Henry turns his back on Falstaff it seems the victory of conformity over comradery, of obligation over empathy. It goes without saying that the film is visually sumptuous, characterized by the brilliant deep-focus and chiaroscuro lighting that are Welles's visual hall mark. But one scene stands out as one of the aesthetically greatest of his career as a director. Falstaff, ostensibly a knight, is fitted with a ludicrous, almost tank sized suit of armor to try to contain his rotund form. This machine of awkwardness is plunged into a brutal battle, equipped only for impotence. The image almost had to have been inspired by Max Ernst's near identical 1921 painting, The Elephant Celebes. But where as Ernst's round robot is terrifying, Welles's knight is the clown prince of all that is human.

The career of Shakespeare's Sir John Falstaff (Orson Welles) as roistering companion to young Prince Hal (Keith Baxter), circa 1400-1413.Who can say bad things about Orson Welles? His work was often neglected in his lifetime, both by audiences and critics. Looking back now, I wonder how they could have missed the genius of "Citizen Kane". But yet, they did for many years.This film is considered to be Welles' favorite of his own (I am unsure of the source for this claim) and has been influential. Yet, it is hard to get a decent copy (the one I have was a Portuguese import). There was no actor with such a presence as Welles, so Shakespeare is natural for him. He has successfully brought the stage to screen.

I think so. I loved his Othello, and thought his Macbeth was flawed but interesting. Chimes at Midnight is one of Welles' masterpieces though, a distinction to go alongside Citizen Kane, Othello and Touch of Evil. I found The Magnificent Ambersons a perfect example of a "flawed" masterpiece. I loved everything about Chimes at Midnight though. It is a funny and very poignant tribute to Shakespeare, utilising not one but five of his plays and to great effect without feeling bloated. It is very well made for a low-budget film, with well placed camera angles and wonderful scenery and costumes. The film also has a haunting score, a witty and moving script, a compelling story that is also affectionate in its tribute to the Bard and the Battle of Shrewsbury is one of the all-time great battle scenes in film, there is a slight clownish air with Falstaff capering around but a lot of it is harrowing and tragic with the soldiers of both armies fighting and dying through blood, sweat and tears almost as if Welles is lamenting the demise of Merrie Old England. The cast are equally fine, with Orson Welles masterful as the blustering, cherubic Falstaff, funny and moving. Of the cast, the best are John Gielgud as a brilliant Henry IV(his Sleep speech is incredibly poetic) and Keith Baxter who succeeds in making Prince Hal his own. But Margaret Rutherford(aka the original Miss Marple) connives convincingly as Mistress Quickly, the Justice Shallow of Alan Webb excellent and delightfully odd and Jeanne Moreau an empathetic Doll. So in a nutshell, a superb film and not just the best of the Welles-Shakespeare films but one of Welles' very best too. 10/10 Bethany Cox