A Thriller Hit With Zither Background

Selznick-Korda An Uneasy Producing Pair of The Third Man (1950) --- Part One

Modern Art Meets Movie Merchandising

David Selznick thought Robert Mitchum would make a better Harry Lime than Orson Welles. More I think about it, the righter he seems. Selznick was painted as philistine mogul by surviving-beyond-him Carol Reed and Grahame Greene, both making a clown of their producer associate for interviewer/audiences cued to laugh at their oft-repeated tales. Of course, without Selznick and his stars/money, there'd have been no Third Man. Selznick had become all the more nit-picking and obsessive by 1949, his finger having slipped off the pulse of public taste. DOS felt movies ought to function in ways that worked before the war. It wasn't easy for him or anyone to realize that this industry and its viewership had changed much with coming of peace.

Again to the Mitchum point: I agree with Selznick that he'd have been better. Mitchum had danger, was capable of anything, even diluting penicillin for children, Harry Lime's worst of many crimes. Perfect casting his would have been for Bob having lately been tapped by L.A. vice at a reefer party. He'd fit right into a black market ... ours, Vienna's, anybody's. Orson Welles, on the other hand, never suggests a threat to me, nor can I accept his doing such horrid things in guise of Harry Lime. And we know he won't throw Holly Martens off the Ferris wheel. Were it Mitchum, we'd be surprised if he didn't. Further recasting: what about Gregory Peck in the Joe Cotten role? Selznick presumably still had his contract, unless The Paradine Case wrapped it up, and Peck v. Mitchum would have raised stakes considerably on that wheel. Not to take anything from The Third Man, however. It's still on my all-time favorites list.

There's more lore on The Third Man than for most from the Classic Era. Several book-length studies were written, and interviews abound with many who survived to the film's placement among settled greats. Enduring myth claims Orson Welles directed his scenes, de facto helming much of The Third Man, according to some. Well, it does look and play like a Welles project. He might have done something nearly as good if someone had let him, but by 1948, OW was a "detriment" to ticket-buying, according to Selznick when he demurred on Orson-casting. Sift through the record shows Welles did not write his dialogue for the Ferris wheel, but did contribute the gag about Switzerland and the cuckoo clock. He came up also with the indigestion routine and repeated mention of pills he can no longer get to relieve it. That's aspect of the scene I remember best, mordant humor woven through otherwise tense conversation. But did Welles suffer for not having directed The Third Man, a film very much in his style and a credit that would have made him solidly bankable again? We could wonder how often he'd be approached by fans who assumed OW was creative force behind a thriller so Wellsian as The Third Man. Could OW have laughed off such misplaced accolade as would John Ford when "congratulated" for Red River, a Howard Hawks job?

Selznick made a lucrative deal on The Third Man. For loan of Joseph Cotten and (Alida) Valli, along with some financing, he'd get Western Hemisphere rights and eventually the negative. Being up-to-minute on boxoffice trends and how other company's product was doing, DOS knew The Third Man would be a challenging sell. Being Brit-made put it dangerously close to an art film, or one people wouldn't want whatever its classification. Most of what came out of England danced on gallows here, if released at all, and arties had a ceiling he'd have to get beyond to realize profit on The Third Man. So yes, Selznick made changes, replacing Carol Reed's voice opener to something more conventional in Joseph Cotten's narration. And DOS took out a reel of footage to juice up pace. A dumb idea we'd say --- who'd choose to watch the US version of The Third Man today? --- but Selznick saw urgency to make his film accessible to statesiders who'd never seen anything quite like this before. He'd pioneer use of television trailers to sell The Third Man, one-minute spots made specifically for home viewing, according to Variety (the spots ran in all 58 TV markets available at the time).

The Third Man wouldn't be a first Occupation-set thriller. That distinction may go to Berlin Express. Earlier arrival in terms of comedy was A Foreign Affair from Billy Wilder/ Paramount. A closer cousin to The Third Man, and a merchandising example Selznick may have consulted, was MGM's The Search, also realist in approach and perceived by many at the time as an art pic. The Third Man was blessed with content that could sell, sex and sudden death a most potent. Misery of bombed-out Vienna populace was secondary to these, The Third Man very Hollywood in that respect despite Reed/Greene's quest for something different. There would be multiple ad styles tendered by the pressbook ("fully three times as many ad mats as are usually furnished for the best pictures," observed Motion Picture Herald), each keyed to specific audience desire, some designed like modern art. This was a very forward-thinking campaign, one that would be imitated by others to come. Selznick was known to oversee every detail of exploitation, so may we credit him with perceptive selling that helped make The Third Man a US hit?

Go HERE for Part Two of The Third Man.