The Cinema Of Orson Welles

A comprehensive and sensitive study of a living master, The Cinema of Orson Welles examines the directing and acting career of this problematic genius.

From Citizen Kane through The Lady from Shanghai and Touch of Evil to The Immortal Story, Welles has defined styles, transformed genres, eschewed conventions, and deepened the psychological powers of the cinema.

Believing that the true creators of film are those “whose work could not be fashioned or expressed in any but cinematic terms,” Peter Cowie has analysed Welles’s techniques and themes as elements of a whole moral vision, realisable only through the camera. With dozens of illustrations, script extracts, chronology, and film-by-film explications, The Cinema of Orson Welles is a basic book on the film life of this most flamboyant and influential figure.

Peter Cowie has written and edited numerous film books, including Ingmar Bergman: A Critical Biography, and the International Film Guide, for which he is series editor.