Film Noir Series: Scotty on The Third Man

Former guest Scott Ippolito is back to launch a new series dedicated to Film Noir. And what better way to start than with the most heralded noir film of all time, The Third Man.

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Movie Crush, a production of I Heart Radio.

(00:29):
Hey everybody, welcome to Movie Crush filmmaker series. We're starting
a new one. You all remember Scottie from All the
Oscar Special You can you can open a can in
front of the Mica affect, right in front of the
mic they want to hurt Ramsey's ears. Be an a
s m R video. Now, tilt that microphone up towards

(00:50):
your beautiful little mouth, to your pretty mouth. Wow, this
one's off to a bad start already. So Scotty you
remember for the Oscars episode he did with Emily and I,
And you also remember him as a reg guest for
Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which was your pick
for favorite film for that day. But truly it's Jaws,

(01:13):
but Jesse Dorn from Bull's Eye. Believe, no, no no, no, Jesse.
It was Roman Mars. Jesse hadn't been on yet, but
he has two movies sort of earmarked for him. Babe,
Pick in the City and uh, it's Jessie's other movie
that he loves, The Something Clown A Thousand Clowns. You

(01:35):
know that movie. I don't, but it sounds way better
than just five clowns. Twice is good. I was just
about to, uh call you one of the great cinephiles.
And you don't know a thousand clowns. I don't know
a thousand Clowns's embarrassing. But if you haven't heard Scotty before,
he is one of my oldest friends. He works in

(01:55):
the film industry. He is a cinematographer DP. When you
go by these days, what other words are there for that?
That's it? I think just dpept occasional camera operator on
some jobs. But people argue with that a DP or
sematographer and everybody has reasons why if you call yourself
one or the other, you're being upity like semial like

(02:17):
you're not a DP anddps? Are you now digital? Like
you're not even taking photographs any long ago? You're just
a monkey with a record button. Uh So that's Scotty's history,
and we are going to do everyone a We kind
of went back and forth over the best like a
couple of months about what to do, what to do

(02:40):
with Scotty? Yeah, I think I think. I think originally
it was you know, if if I was going to
do a filmmaker series, it was hard not for not
to be the Cohen Yeah, we were gonna do the
Cohen Brothers straight up, and then I don't I don't
know if I think it might have been your idea
to just maybe make make it more thematic than filmmaker specific,
and we landed on film noir. I always been a

(03:02):
soccer for the film. Now, wir you wrote a film
war movie, didn't you? Or at least a murder mystery. Yes.
I've written a lot of bad movies. Never read one
of them. Oh what happened to that last one? Can
I read that one? Good Scott? He's such a good writer,
but he suffers from no one shall ever gaze eyes

(03:24):
upon my work syndrome, which is really just bullshit. And
I've been giving you shit about it for twenty years.
The girlfriend says the same thing. Yeah, and we were
writing partners at one point, but I got tired of
not reading anything he wrote. I was like, is he
even any good? I think he might be a literate

(03:45):
It's possible. So we decided film noir and UM. Before
we get into the movie, though, I have to say
that since you mentioned Jaws, everyone should know and maybe
I'll post these on the Facebook page UM for my
daughter's fourth birthday, Scotty and his girlfriend Lily gave her
a couple of things, but gave her a Appearans know this.

(04:06):
There's certain things you can put in water that will
grow and expand we've had one before. It was I
don't remember what it was, but it didn't expand that much.
It was like a they're they're usually a bit of
a guy gift, like the grow your own boyfriend or
grow your own girlfriend. Seen. That was the first one
I ever saw, I think. But they gave her a shark,

(04:27):
and so I've been sending Scotty daily texts on the
growth of the shark. That says it would grow to
six times its size. Well that's true because he came
six or eight inches, So six times eight, that's that's
gonna be a four ft shark in my bathtub, I think.
So I can't wait. It was on might post some

(04:48):
of these what was the book again? That was Walter
and there was something about a walrus and a shark
like a little girls. I don't know. We haven't ready yet.
We got a stack of park we're working our way
through him. But yeah, that the shark went started out
on a bowl and then went to a picture water picture,
and now I was just like, what am I doing?
I just went and we have a guest bathtub now,

(05:11):
and I put it in the guest bathtub. I hope
it's still there when I stay as a guest. I
wondering how long it's gonna take her. On day eight,
I need something in there for scale. I need your
hand or it's a bathtub. It's not like a bathtub
for babies or giants. It's just a bathtub. That's all sedu.
You should come over and see it in person, though,
But that is neither here nor there. Everyone. What is

(05:34):
really here and there is the movie The Third Man. Yeah,
one of my favorites. I guess we should, you know, Noirs,
I'm sure everybody knows. Yeah, we should set up what
this is all about. Kind of became really hit their
stripe probably after War War two, when there was you know,
just sort of general disillusionment, right, you know, really after

(05:56):
people were down for depress. This maybe he came out
in forty nine, but I mean certainly Noirs pre date this.
But usually have your sort of anti hero, often your
detective is, you know, although he is trying to do
the right thing, he's like the cops are against them,
and you know, so they sort of when sometimes they're
like alcoholics or yeah, but they're very least loaners and

(06:18):
depressed even Yeah, but usually with a strong sense of
their own sense of justice. Yeah, there's not necessarily societally embraced.
Could be back alley. Yeah, pretty much everybody sort of
gets there's and h in most noirs, like usually everything
is punished, right, nobody really gets away with anything except

(06:38):
I guess maybe Chinatown. That's a good example, which covered
with chat or budd each end um. So it's thematic,
but it's also phil Noir is um known for its
visual aesthetic as well. Yeah, very generally. Yeah, dark lighting,
there's always there's always many blinds. Yeah, there's always a

(07:00):
wine pattern on the wall. Really, even if there aren't
many blinds. Okay, I don't know, I don't know how
they do that, but it's always there. Well that's funny.
Uh so blinds, dark shadows, black and white ideally, Yeah, yeah,
that's your fem fatale usually has you know, if she
if she isn't your somebody's undoing, she is certainly attempting

(07:22):
to be our anti heroes undoing. But there's a lot
of great ones, and that was sort of our thought,
is to maybe do a few film noirs, and I thought,
why not start with a classic one before we moved into,
you know, an Asian noir or you know some of
the more you know neo noirs. Yeah, because their sub genres,
right gen was Yes, was doing Star Wars. Yeah, we

(07:45):
can do Star Wars too. That's the film war. Uh,
it says here I looked up the first film noir,
but they list the Maltese Falcon as possibly the first
film noir. It's said as widely regarded as the first
major film noir of the classic era. That's a lot
of qualifiers, but I can buy that. It's interesting. The

(08:06):
Maltese Falcon is always interesting to me because it's such
a complex one in the sense of like I have
a hard time imagining like current audience is really falling
in love with it, Like didn't they remake that happy?
I don't think. So. Now what am I thinking of?
I'm thinking of Three Days of the Condor. It's another
bird movie, which is actually based on a book called

(08:26):
Six Days of the Condor. Can we get it down
to two days? The twelve minutes of the Condor is
the newest version eight minute. Abe is gonna be screaming
on your phone. Trust me, you loved it. You've already
seen it, so uh all right. So if this is correct,
then this film is within the first decade of the

(08:49):
film noir. Have a hard time saying that it's gonna
be a long hour, newer filmer film newer. But the
third Man had uh never seen Scottie. Really you believe? That?
Is John Hodgments favorite movie, by the way, but he
refuses to talk about it on the show. He will
only talk about Avengers movies at that a month twice.

(09:10):
That's sort of the running gag. Now, Um, but yeah,
he won't come on and talk about it, So we're
we're gonna do it. I like old movies, big old
movie fan. I remember seeing this one with my dad
when I was little, and what I remembered is I
really liked the title. Yeah. Uh, I didn't even know
what that meant until last night's Can you believe that? Well?
I mean, that's the wonderful thing about movies. I didn't

(09:32):
know what the title meant, and in fact, until I
don't know it's about the twenty or thirty minute mark.
When they talk about the two men and I was
laying on my couch and oh that was a literal
third man. It's it's such a strange movie too, because
it's you know, it's it's really kind of a who
done it? A little bit? You know, you're you're you're,

(09:53):
you're there with you know, trying to figure out what's
going on, and you know, Orson Wells is in it,
but he doesn't appear for over an hour, and it's
one of the most famous entrances in film history. Yeah,
and it's I think Scorsesey says it's like the best
reveal of all time, you know, yeah, I read that
article he love. Yeah, and there. I mean, it's like
the six Cents in the sixth sense, like you could

(10:13):
really spoil that movie, and for someone this one, it's like,
you know, Wars and Walls is in it. Yeah, you
didn't show up for an hour and you're still you know,
kind of glued to your seat. Yeah, yeah, what was it?
We used to joke about six Cents of how we
would describe it to people, the worst movie review of
all time. Bruce Willis is turned as a ghost in
sixth Cents was both stunning and six cens good. Yeah,

(10:35):
it was all right. Bruce Willis played this dead guy.
This kid could see him. It was kind of cool.
Oh okay, you should see it for sure, real surprise
and stuff. And then you go and see it and
you're like, it doesn't seem like a ghost for like
eight minutes alright, quick aside, English Patient, I went. I

(10:57):
saw that with Spice back in the night. You remember
our friends by We went and saw it. It was
like one of those things that you know, very much
like the Sign Felt show where you're a bad person
if you haven't seen and loved In the English Patient.
We had waited too long. We're trying to go see it, right,
we find you know, we're I think it was a
fifth Plaza for a few minutes later we get in there.
It turns out there was like three shows of it.

(11:17):
So we thought we were about five minutes. Like, we're
really like fifty minutes late. So oh no, saw it's
like forty minutes. Took good but I thought it was
like the rsst film of all time. I'm like, boy,
they really started writing in the middle. Like I'm usually
pretty good up figuring out the first five minutes, but
I'm thrown. Yeah, who's this guy and dead? Who's all
this figured? Yeah? God, I finally saw that actually not

(11:38):
too long ago, believe it or not, for the first time. Um. Alright,
So The Third Man directed by Carol Reid, um written
by Graham Green, who I know you're a big fan
of his work, right, Yeah, this was I think him
and Read worked together three times. This was their second
time to I mean, this is like really a great
run of movies for Carol Reid. He had uh what

(11:59):
were the three of him? Uh, there was one the
Fallen Idol was the one right before this, and then uh,
he had one with James Mason right before that Man Out,
which of course Oliver too. Yeah, which was the one
he won the Oscar for very like this one. I
think he won the Palm deg or whatever whatever the

(12:20):
cans prize was before. I don't think they called it
the Palm de or then, but they called it the
French Fry think one of the French French Fry. Um.
But the producer Alex Quarter, actually he sent Graham Green
to Vienna to write, right. He wanted him to write
a script based on sort of the four part division
of Vienna after the war he had the Russian sector,

(12:41):
which I didn't know the British. Yeah, it was sort
of like eastern kind of a weird way. Yeah. And
in that beginning voiceover, um, it really like sets it
up very well. I mean because it flat out says
what's going on. Yeah, but it's sort of I mean,
it wasn't quite a newsreel, but it really helps set
the table for a viewer to know that. Yeah, it's
like such a great setting for a noir. I mean,

(13:02):
think about I mean justices, you know, probably sir extra
extra judicially if at all. Well, that's right, I mean
you think about it. There's when you think about four
governments in one city and I've been to Vienna, um,
and they would rule like a month at a time.
It'd be like it's the Britain's fund told really be
in charge, and then the next month it's at least

(13:23):
it's a clusterfucky and it's more red tape and bureaucracy
and like not even to say things like law enforcement
in like, uh, it's not my jurisdiction, he was. I mean,
did the divide it by city block? Well, I think
there are four divisions than the heart of the city
was run by everybody, and they all just they all
rode together, like four guys who don't speak the same language.

(13:46):
Because it happens in the film there a couple of
times where the one of the politz I or whatever
it was an American and I was like, oh, that's right,
they're all like just working together. Yeah, it's clumsily. What's
where we were when I was young, I was really young.
We were in Germany and there was a there was
this East German guy who killed or I think he

(14:08):
shot I'm not sure if he killed him, but a
Russian guy. There was like a Russian monument in West Germany.
Of all places, this Russian monument ended up so it
was protected by Russian soldiers, but it was in the
free section of Berlin. So he kills this guy and
then he goes on the run. And so like the
American families like like if the Americans were evacuated out

(14:28):
of West Berlin, then the Russian soldiers would guard them.
So like, you know, my mom is freaking out, and like,
you know, me and my older brothers and I'm tiny,
like we're being evacuated. You know, Russian guys like for
some reason, the Russian guys would protect us, and if
it was first vice, first of the English people would
have protected. Yeah, such a strange time. I know it

(14:51):
seems arbitrary. Walls are cool. I mean, I think we
all know that. I mean that's a big takeaway. So cool. Uh.
Produced by David Dozelzi, David Ozelznick Selznick, and Alex Corda.
Alex Corder was sort of the the real producer. Yeah,
he was the one who was Carol Reid was kind
of his protege, right. He was the one who saw

(15:11):
something good in him. And it's interesting because Graham Green
actually did reviews of like some of uh, Carol Read's
early movies. Like Graham was pretty prolific writer. He'd brought
lots of essays and articles and and uh so he
was a fan of his even before this. But that's cool. Well,
they I know, they had to um battle with Salznick. Um.
You know, he's back in l A. He didn't want

(15:32):
him to shoot in Vienna. He's like, why are you
doing that? Like, well, because this post war Vienna, it's
already bombed out. It's kind of perfect. They've built a
set for us. Uh. He didn't want him to use.
And of course you have to talk about the is
it pronounced zither? Oh? The zither music? Yeah, I mean
that's a this dude, Anton carrass here's the story he gets,

(15:54):
I guess while Carol is in uh in there? You
know he went there to or did he send Graham
Green there to write? He sent Graham Green there to
research the novel? Now is that? But but Carol the director?
I keep calling Carol like he's my buddy. Read. I
feel like Steven Soderberg, like one of the he did

(16:16):
a commentary, and there's a few. There's a few good commentaries,
and one of him he said that apparently the guy
was just like playing like the welcome party for the
crew as they well, guy saw that he played. He
discovered him in the cafe. It's this and no one
had he had never even heard of this instrument, dude.
And I'm pretty well versed in my stringed instruments, and
I've never heard of the zither and it's uh, you

(16:38):
can look it up online. It looks like a cross
between an auto harp, but it also has a neck
of a guitar attached to it. Well, and that's one
of the great things about the opening of the movie
is it looks like it's just a close up of
the sound hole in the strings movement, and it's there's
something like almost solid bass about it. It's so graphic. Yeah,
it's great, and you don't and you know, Americans had

(17:00):
never really heard this instrument much, and it sounded. Uh,
it's weird because it's it's become so iconic that score
and the use of this instrument that it's become most
almost like a character in the movie because it's always
there when you least expect it, and at first it
sounds like jaunty and happy, but then through the context
of this film has this weird, sinister quality. Well, the

(17:24):
the movie in general is kind of that way too.
I think I think Green actually called it a comedy thriller,
but it's for his for for a lot of murder
and horrible things and that happened. It's it always keeps
sort of a jaunty you know, it's kind of got
that cynical Gallows humor to it. Even at the beginning
when Joseph Cotton first arrives in Vienna as he's going

(17:44):
to do or some wells apartment, he walks under that ladder,
and it's just such a great It's just comical. You know,
it's like, oh, this guy's about to have bad luck.
I didn't even catch that he walked right under a ladder. Yeah,
just and he's like, so he just gotten so perfect.
He's is so ignorant this whole movie. He's just constantly like,
you know, the Russians demand that demand that are our

(18:06):
female lead turn over her papers? And he's like, don't
give him anything. He's like such an American about it,
like like she has a choice. Well, he shows that
American bravado a couple of times, because another time he's like, yeah,
they can't do anything to me. I got my papers
in order, Like, yeah, they can kind of do whatever
they wanted. I bet apparently they Actually they actually sent
someone over to coach the writing of the script a

(18:27):
little bit, to get the Americans just right. There was
there was a worry that the Americans were basically you
had Joseph Cotton, who's a bit of a buffoon, and
then you have Orson Wells, who's, you know, the bad guy,
and that was your that was your Americans in the film.
Graham Green, famous for writing about the Ugly American. Yeah, well,
I mean, and if you think about it, it's it's
sort of fitting in a in a sense. I mean,

(18:47):
here comes this. I mean, Holly Martin's you know, Josepotten
ends up doing the right thing, but he just sort
of bumbles his way all the way through with the bravado.
And he's not a master detective or anything that's a
writer help cowboy. He's yelling at a you know, the
guy about you know, you're trying to pin this crime
on a dead guy. And then you know, finally his

(19:09):
friend is a terrible person. So let's just play a
quick bit and we're all over the place here, but
we'll substitute in later the real clip. But for you
and I for reference, we'll just go ahead and play
what the zither sounds like. So not what you would

(19:43):
expect for film, are though, right? Yeah? I mean, you know,
or or a lot of films. I mean, there's a
lot of films things that have a one instrument score. No,
you're totally right, But somehow it works, man. And I
don't know if it's like the tail wag the dog like,
because the movie became so iconic, the score did or

(20:04):
not it's hard to tell. Yeah, it became, it became
a big hit. It was the huge It was the
Lime theme. Yeah, the Harry Lime theme in it. Like
people were dancing at this and apparently apparently what's his name, Krass,
the the zither player, Like he went on tour and
he opened he went back to Vienna and opened a
bar called the Third Band. God of course he did.

(20:24):
Even now you can go see The Third Man plays
weekly at does it really the bird Keno or something
in Vienna? And like you go on tours of the
Sower System. Well, I went there in Um with Chappie
in the mid nineties before I knew about this movie. Uh,
we did see pulp fiction in Um. Cheese was at
Vienna or Holland one of the two, not for the

(20:45):
first time. We had seen him before. But um, I
did not know The Third Man, but I knew about
there was a famous noir film with the ferris wheel,
So I did you know? We went and rode the
ferris wheel. That's pretty cool. But now I know, like
which I could go back and do that again. Speech
is still there, still there. I don't know. I mean,

(21:06):
I guess it's the same one. Maybe they have improved
it over time. I think I was the biggest one
in the world for a long time. So let's talk
about the look of the film a little bit. Um.
I mean, we have to talk about the Dutch angles
because I don't know if there are straight angles. I
guess there are. It's yeah, it's it's the use of

(21:28):
of the angles is so consistent that you just it's
unbelievable that they pulled off in a way. Usually it's
usually remember we saw Battlefield Earth. Was that you when
I saw that together? I never saw that. It's uh,
the well, of course it's the scientology kind of alien movie.
But it's just dutchess back and forth, left right left right, left, right,

(21:49):
left right, and it is so awful. In addition to
like you know, Forest whittwaker ring and high heeled boots
and kiss boots and stuff. It's it's we need to
do a special like bad if I like that one
in Jupiter sent that you're trying to Jupiter. We saw
that together in the theater, so Shakespeare, ye bad, But yeah,

(22:10):
I mean it's somehow he pulls it off, you know.
And I think when you watch the Soderberg Tony Gilroy commentary,
like Gilroy keeps going, do you think he covered it
both ways so he could just cut it later? And
interesting in Soderberg is just kind of like he just
just did it. But somehow it works, you know. It's
and I've heard people say that. I feel like even
in school, like we were taught that, like whenever someone's
lying to him at the cameras. But I've never really

(22:34):
been able to There's it's touched a lot that many
lies in this movie. I think, Yeah, I've never been
able to equate it with anything. Yeah, like any sort
of numerical or you know, like there's any code to it, right, Yeah,
I don't think so. Um, it looks great though. I
mean that that first bit where he has a conversation
up the stairway with the German Man very early in

(22:55):
the film, those frames look like mc ser paintings or something.
It's you know, with the staircases and that black and
white and those Dutch angles, is just crazy how great
it looks. Sometimes I wonder if if the Dutch angles
like really work because of the black and white, like
it just becomes more graphic. It helps. I think, Yeah,
that's think that because how do why is Dutch angle

(23:15):
sort feel a little comic book when they're in color. Yeah. Yeah,
like MTV is the real World, which, by the way,
I found my audition tape really yeah, that's cleaning out
audition when I was in Athens and instead of like
a little five minute thing, we did like a fake
real world episode. Of course, being my brother, so I
dug it out the other day, I was like, ah,
I need a VCR. Uh. We can probably get one cheap. No, yeah, exactly. Uh.

(23:42):
Now I'm gonna dig it up though, we'll watch it.
We'll have it remastered. Um. But beyond that, like almost
the entire film takes place at night. There are very
few daytime scenes. Yeah, when they do it looks rainy. Yeah. Well,
they shot a lot on On They shot I think
six weeks in in Vienna, and then they went back
to England and did sets for everything, like everything is

(24:07):
there sets for everything, And I guess they had to
do sets for the sewers too, because Orson Wells wouldn't
heard about that. Yeah, and he was like weeks late. Yeah,
you know, which is which is great because a lot
of those iconic shots of the of the big shadow
of the third man moving you know, off in the
distance where you don't know who it is. It's not
him anyway, It was just out of necessity, you know.

(24:27):
It was the guy Hamilton's the a d of the
movie got you know, they put him in a coat
and hat and did they interesting? Yeah, he was Carol
reads like he was kind of his guy. Yeah, he
was cool to apparently. Later he went on to direct
a bunch of the Bond movies and even Pain like
Callaghan's assistant Pain, he's one of the best characters in

(24:47):
the movie. He's He's end Later on in the James
pomer he looked familiar. There's two ms in this movie.
There's another guy who becomes the guy who sets him
up for the literary thing. Was he and him? Yeah?
I think so, the long faced guy. Yeah, because both
looks really familiar to me. It's totally bond Um. Yeah,
that guy, Uh, Callaway's Callaway, his assistant guy, was the

(25:09):
most likable character in the film. Like he he punched
him out at the very beginning of media is like,
I'm so sorry. Yeah, he's so brittish. He's the biggest
fan and he like knocks him down, but he has to.
He insulted. You know, he insulted his superior. He just
punched him in the mouth. The media was like, Okay,
come on, let's take care of you. He's so affable,

(25:29):
and I mean this of course we're going to spoil
the whole movie. But I hate that he got killed
in the end. It's terrible. That was the worst part
of the movie. He does. It's well, I mean, what
we should talk about the movie? Whann't we want we
run our right through the movie? Well? Were we were
near the beginning anyway, so you know, we's star at
the beginning before we get to the end, because if
you because if we get to the end, I want
to talk forever about the end. That's right, we'll get there. Um, well,

(25:53):
we meet Holly Martin's when in that name is a
sort of a running joke in the movie. Yeah, it's
kind of a ridiculous a man named Holly and Holly
Martin's and he even makes a joke at the end
about his name. Sorry, I didn't mention the end in
the In the novella, his name was Rollo. Oh really roll,

(26:14):
which I think I think rightly so I think they
thought was not very American. It was more of a
I don't know, Yeah, a silly British name and a
silly American. Yeah, totally. But the whole concept of the
if you haven't seen the movie and you want another plot,
is this American goes to Vienna at the behest of
his friend Harry Lime, and we don't really know. He's

(26:37):
just like kind of come on over here, I guess,
like an opportunity. This guy's a pulp novelist. And when
he gets it there, his friend is dead, supposedly been
hit by a car or a bus. And um, there's
the film Fatale is the woman that he was seeing.
Um what is that actor? Actor's name? Ali il Think
Valley Alive, Alida Alida Valley, Alida Alley. What has she

(27:00):
been in? She had a budget, but she she ended
up she was in Suspiria later on and Eyes Without
a Face. Who was she in Suspiria? I think she
was one of the older teachers. Wow, yeah, I think
she had. She was kind of considered an Igmar Bergmann

(27:21):
type in Italy, and I think she ended up just
going back to doing stage work mostly and more European films.
It wasn't that her career didn't go anywhere. It was
just she sort of disappeared from the American Yeah yeah, yeah, sure, well,
which means she didn't do shit exactly. She wants to
make real art. Not exactly. Um so there's this woman

(27:42):
as well, but basically when she suggests that it wasn't
an accident, um is when he decides, you know what,
I'm gonna stay see if I can figure out what's
going on. Um after being kind of told to leave
because hey, your friend was a bad guy. He's in racketeering. Yeah,
he shows up there, He goes to his friend's apartment
and the porter just telling him, oh, you just missed him.

(28:05):
He he just got hit by a car. That was
pretty funny, you know. So there were funny parts in
it because I found myself laughing a couple of times,
and I was like, all right, I guess this is
supposed to be a little funny. Yeah, I think. I
think that's one of the great things about it, and
it keeps it light, you know, it's it's the funnest
film the war you'll oversee. I think like that. I mean,
I thought there were a couple of visual jokes, like

(28:27):
when the huge shadow was coming at the end, at
the steak out and it was a guy with the balloons.
Like that's a joke, right, And then when later when
earlier when Holly's being chased by the little kid called
him a murderer. You see the little kid has a
giant shadow too. Man, that kid's gonna give me nightmares. Jesus.

(28:50):
That scene was really tense, and once again, Holly Martin
is just an idiot. He's running out there and she's
you know, she's like, they think you're the murderer. Yeah, well,
and he keeps saying like, I don't speak you anguige.
I'm like, dude, they're saying murder. It's I guess a
cognate or something. Because it's kind of clear what's going on.
It's funny, Uh, it's it's and it's at the end

(29:11):
of the first act that we learn of the third man.
I made that note, you know, structurally that classic screenplay,
you know, right at that thirty minute mark, that was
a third man. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's great because he
keeps going, like everybody keeps telling the story and it
just never adds up. It's like, well, we watched him
across two people carried him across the street, and then

(29:32):
somebody else says, oh there was a well he was
talking to us and telling us this, and somebody I
was like, oh he died instantly, and yeah. Well, plus
it's like I think his doctor comes along right after
he gets hit. R Winkle, Dr Finkel. That's a joke,
and he actually gets hit by his own driver. Yeah, supposedly,
it's like yeah, yeah, yeah, none of it sounds very no,

(29:53):
And at the very least it's enough for for Joseph
Cotton to to stay like he's being asked to leave
and he won't leave, which is sort of a I
don't know if it's quite a trope, but I've seen
that before in movies, like you know, do the smart
thing and just go go back to your home. Yeah, exactly, questions, Well,

(30:13):
and he thinks he feels like that, you know, just
since his friend is dead, they're going to pin this
bracketeering black market crime on him to close the case.
He thinks the police are dirty, Um, so he's going
to prove that. Initially, he thinks he's going to prove
that Harry was murdered and it wasn't just an accident. Yeah,
there's a lot of red herrings. Actually, yeah, I think

(30:34):
that's That's one of the things I really like about
this one is is that every everything drives the story forward,
like you never really feel like you go off on
a tangent, Like everything is driving, like he keeps finding
out more information about that day, what happened, and all
of that leads to naturally to whatever the next scene is.
It's kind of like Chinatown. Chinatown and had that amazing
where nothing seemed extraneous, every every every little detail illuminated

(30:59):
another avenue of inquiry. Yeah, based upon you know what
happened to Harry. Yeah, it's interesting. Emily and I were
talking about Sofia Coppola the other day because I had
just done the films Somewhere in Here with someone Else
with Paul, and uh, she sort of, you know, there's
as a writer like you always hear like you always

(31:19):
gotta be driving that plot forward, like always got to
be moving it forward. But she sort of, and especially
in Noir, I think he really it helps. But she
issues that a bit, and she has a lot of
scenes and shots that are like atmospheric and don't drive
the story for it at all, but maybe they drive
the overall mood. Um. So I don't think it's like
the total rule of thumb that you've always gotta be

(31:41):
driving it forward. Yeah, well, I think in her movie
so many of them are character driven, an atmospheric like
lost in translations. You know about this this girl you
know who's with her successful husband, right, and she's sort
of what is she doing with her days? Right? You
know how long the script was for somewhere? How long?
Sixty pages? Can you believe that? Isn't that crazy? Some

(32:05):
how it works? God? Um, all right, so back to
this movie. Um, he's on the scene. He's basically trying
to run this little investigation. He's interviewing everyone that he
can get access to, and he's met with uh, the
sort of assistance. Yeah, well, he's sort of he just
looks into everything that happens to him to like originally

(32:25):
he has no money, he's supposed to that, you know.
The callahan wants to put him on a plane the
next day. And then there's like a cultural attache who's
doing a symposium sort of mistakes him for a real
writer when he just writes these like you know, bad
western novels. Yeah, he's like, oh, you can speak at
our thing. And he's like well, can I stay put

(32:46):
me up here at the hotel? He just everything, just
people just keep giving him money when he shows up
and he has no money, and and so it's just
dumb luck the whole way. He's yeah, that's funny. He
didn't come across as a bumbling guy. It's a weird
mix between the trope of sort of the cuckt sure
one step ahead of everything, and a bumbling idiot. He's

(33:07):
he's sort of a likable guy and it just all
kind of happens in front of him. Yeah. Yeah, well,
just throughout the movie, he's always sort of it's it's
like he's always putting himself in danger for no reason,
you know, like he's telling people things he shouldn't tell them. Yeah,
that's true. He's like, I no know, He's just like like,
I think you're the killer in They're like, well yeah,

(33:28):
and I think in fact that the murder scene, I
think he does that very thing there. I think he says,
you know, basically to Vultuous, like well who he isn't
what he's doing there or something. I can't remember exactly,
but I remember thinking like, why are you telling them that?
It all works out for him though, it does. Um. Well,

(33:48):
that's actually when that happens is after he goes to
see you know, Anna is shaken down by Major Callaway
and that's where we learned that she has faked her
papers and has illegally in country and so he's going
to deport her basically, so that kind of sets up
that b story that she's gonna be leaving town soon. Yeah. Yeah,

(34:10):
she's uh, you know that she was Henry's or Harry's girlfriend,
and I guess that was you know, in addition to
the black market, he got a got some got a
good deal on some fake passports. Yeah. Well she says
later too that he's the one that help helps her
do that, right, like either faked him or bought them.
I guess, um. And that's when they you know, they

(34:33):
one of the guys, you know, he goes to see
the Dr Wrinkel and then the um there's such a
great cast of characters. The first guy he meets, Baron Kurtz.
He's like carrying the Oklahoma Kid book. I am the
Baron brothers are probably marketing back to that guy. Remember
the dude in Intolerable Cruelty And he looks so evil too.
It's just like the Holly's like sitting there and thinking
that he's like such a good guy to Harry's friend,

(34:56):
and you just I feel like the audience you have
to know what this guy's evil. It's kind of like
Max fo and Seat showing up right, you know, when
he showed up in Minority Report, I was like worst
red hearing of all time. It's like, I know, Max
mont I was going to be the bad guy. He
might be Tom Cruise's friend right now, but by the end,
he was going to be the bad like terrible. Yeah,
there are definitely certain actors where like you put him
in Act one and they're going to go off. At

(35:17):
Act three, he goes to see Vinkle and that's when
he gets called out as the murderer because um, the
dude has been killed. The well the porter was he was?
He the porter The porter is a is the guy

(35:37):
that he first meets when he goes into goes to
see Harryts apartment. He's the one that says, oh, you're
five minutes too later. Your your friends dead? You know
I just left see the guy with the wife who
doesn't want him to talk to him? Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Because I feel like you're two guys that kind of
look alike. Well, now it's the porter who's who who
keeps in earlier he all, he's like yelling at him,

(35:58):
saying he needs to he's when it brings up the
third man and he's like, we need to go to
the police, and they arguing. The little boy actually oversees
them arguing, which is why Wade and he was to
meet him too, right, because he said, hey, come around
when my wife's not here and I can really talk
to you. And then he's killed, correct, Okay, yeah, like
well like instantly too, because he's like gills out the

(36:19):
holly and says, no, come tonight, why my wife and
clothes turns around though, he turns around and like, whoever's
going to kill him? So Orson Wells right? Or was
it his wife? I don't know. I may assume it
was Orson Wells. I mean it's got to be you
would think or and Orson Welles is the third man, right?
Or is he? I think so would say he is.
I mean that's probably a dumb thing to say. But

(36:39):
the idea was that the third man carried a body.
I mean, did they have a body. Was it the
guy that they buried or did they just fake and
lie this whole thing. Well, of course, the person who
ends up being buried in Harry's grave is is Harvin,
the guy who's getting the black market penicillin from, which
was a real life thing that Graham Green heard about

(36:59):
the big exactly. Yeah, that was he heard that from
some Royal Air Force people or something. Yeah, and so
he thought it was a good jumping off point for
a movie noir or whatever. Um okay, So yeah, I mean,
I'm definitely going to see this movie more in my life,
and I think some of those like plat points will
be own shut with repeated viewings. Well, Worson is definitely

(37:20):
the third mat okay, But I think that's the whole thing,
is that the story of him getting hit, It's like,
at first he's helped across the At first he dies instantly,
and then later someone says, well, he told me to
make sure I took care of you when he got
did he give you instructions? And it's like, well, how
many people carried him to the curve, And and then
of course, like you know, his doctor shows up immediately,
and you know, it's it's all very fishy. So yeah, Yeah,

(37:42):
it's it's sort of a natural loose thread for Holly
to start pulling on. And yeah, you know, and given
that he thinks his friend doesn't think his friend is
a bad guy, of course he thinks, well, maybe he
was murdered, right right, Uh, then you get one of
the great fake out scenes in movies when he gets
shoved into that car and like driven it breaking next
speed all through town, and you think, well, first of all,

(38:04):
it's funny at the beginning, like it's clearly he's being
basically abducted. Um. And then he's saying like, no, you're
missing the street. I'm supposed to go over here, Like, dude,
he's not listening to you. Yeah, after after the little
boy tried says he's a murder in the crowdsorce starts
to chase him. He runs, and well, I think he
finally gets to his hotel, right, because his hotel, he's

(38:25):
he's like getting me a car and they're like we
have when he was already here waiting for you whatever.
That shady looking driver. Yeah he was a well cast guy,
and you sir throws him man and draws him and
and you think for sure he's about to Yeah, you know,
he's you're you thinking, for sure you're about to find
out who's the bad guy? Right, you know? But where
does he take him? He takes him to the literary
maybe so great. It's because he shoved into this room

(38:46):
and they're like, brocome, it's always like a surprise party exactly.
He's kind of like hiding and cowering as the door
opens and everybody's like, surp, that's really bunny. And then
that's a train wreck, you know, because he's what, what's
the one question they asked him about while they're asking
him about like James Joyce and stuff, and I wow,
that was funny too. Stream of consciousness stream and sets
it and he's like, what, I uh James Joyce? Yeah,

(39:09):
I think brings up his favorite authors, author of Zane Gray. Right,
you know, pretty much code for dumb American? Is that
what it was? Um? Really good fake out though, and
then they also another one of the great jokes is uh,
when he when he's in the dark room and there's
the dancing cockatoo when he turns on the light, he

(39:31):
bites him on the way out. Just I mean, it's
such a silly movie in some ways to you know,
but in the next scene, like he gets bit by
the cockatoo and the next scene he's with Callaway again.
He is He's like, Martin, what happened to your finger?
He has a parrot bit me. He goes stop acting
like a fool Mosson, but like that's literally what happened.

(39:51):
It just wasn't apparent. Yeah. Well, I mean it's at
this point that it's no surprise that foolish things are
happening to this pool. But you know he's Callaway is
is that's another bit of a fake out. Is you know,
you think these guys are bad cops or something, and
like he's right that he his friend was a bad guy.
He had this black market penicillin ring. That's like killing

(40:14):
children because they're getting deluded selling back. I guess deluded penicillin.
It's not effective. Uh, And he's so what seems seems
like sort of harmless becomes life threatening. You know. Yeah,
but I wonder if if Harry Lime, like, if confronted
with that, would care because he's only in the movie

(40:35):
a few minutes, like six or eight minutes or something
even less. Well's the well, it's I mean, that's that's
the interesting thing. Is when they're on the ferrest. Well,
later on when he's talking to Holly, he's like, you know,
he's looking at He's like that, they're just little dots
from down here. It's like, you know, would your life
really change if a few of those dots just stopped moving?
You've got twenty thousand pounds for each dot that stopped moving.
I didn't catch that line. How would you know? How

(40:56):
would you feel about him? Then? And it's always and
then there's alway touch a dark humor to he's like
pounds per tot and and that's tax free, my friend, Yeah,
tax free. Well, I mean that's the big reveal in
our end, Like we're saying that such a great reveal
because he's first of all, there's a set up with
the cat and some great lines because he's up there, Um,

(41:16):
Holly is in love or he thinks he's in love
with Anna and she's like the cat only liked Harry. Yeah. Yeah,
it's such a great line. He's got the little he's
got the string on the flower. Well, there's an interesting
scene before that. I want to see what you think
after after Callahan basically call and says I'm going to
give you evidence that that Harry was a bad guy,

(41:40):
you know what I mean. And and there's that great
montage of like and I think call ann or callaway,
I get it wrong because they say it back and forth.
In the movie Holly like everybody she called him hairy.
She calls him Harry all the time, called Holly Harry.
But he says, bring up the magic lantern show pain
And they bring out the the slide show and a

(42:02):
rhinoceros popped up, you know, another great joke. Yeah, he's
going to show but there's all that evidence. It's like fingerprints,
and you know, you can't can't dispute a fingerprint, you know. Yeah,
that seems still seem like set up though, like that
they had faked that stuff just to get Joseph Cotton
out of the country. Well he's well, he's I mean,
he's pretty down after that. And he ends up in

(42:24):
that bar, which I think is you know, a brothel.
Basically there's all these women, there's nobody in it but
him and all these women at the bar who are
all turned and looking at him. And there's a old
lady selling flowers. Oh yeah, maybe so. And then there's
a woman who comes down the steps as he that's right,
and I was like, is that a brothel he's in?
It might have been, you know, actually, um. But then

(42:45):
he goes to see um Alita to confess his love
and then once again he's just a bumbling idiot, you know.
And I think she even tells him. She's like, if
you were to call me on the phone and asked
me if he were fair, darker, had a mustache, I
wouldn't know. Basically, she could have couldn't have. Any is
interested in him, and he's kind of he's drunk. She
calls him out on he's kind of a drunk. I mean,

(43:05):
I think he is a drunk bas he's like a
drunk writer. Um. But she yeah, she excuses him basically,
and that that that whole thing kind of set up
the cat thing because the big reveal, you see the
cat um nipping at the wingtips. Yeah, they the figure
hiding in the shadows and drunk Colliges like yelling at him.

(43:26):
He's like, why are you following me? Once again, he's
just an idiot. The neighbor turns on the light and
it's or some wils and he just has that perfect
smirk that rye little smile so good. It's such a
great reveal. Um, I have to say, I watched the
last like forty minutes of it this morning, and um,
Ruby came out there with me, woke up and just
like nuzzled in with me on the couch. She she

(43:49):
watched the last forty minutes of this movie solid and
the only like things she said, like a couple of
scenes after that, what happened to the cat? And then
there was one more thing she said later I can't remember.
I could basically told her he's a bad guy and
these are the good guys are chasing him, because she
understands that. And she said, I want to chase bad
guys one day when I'm a firefighter. That's what she said.

(44:12):
I was like, well, not quite the same job. I
like her vision of firefighting. Unless he wants to be
an arson investigator there you go, or smoke jumper. Well,
you're not chasing bad guys unless the bad guys the
smoke guys fire. So we finally get the third man.
We finally get Orson Wells in there. Uh he Hollie

(44:32):
chases him and he disappears, and then he goes back
to Callaway and says I saw him, which which you know,
callboy thinks he's well, he knows he's an idiot, and
so he thinks he thinks he must just be drunk.
And I think that's when he finally, well, that's when
they discover the sewer passage or whatever. He's like, what
did he just disappeared to thin at and there's that

(44:55):
door in the middle of the streets, like, or did
he go through that door and go down? Yeah, apparently
there's a there's an amazing sewer system under Vienna, but
it looks like the aqueducts of Rome or something. Yeah,
that's I mean, the Vienna is high up on the
list and for no other reason than to ride the
ferris wheel see the movie there, And you know what

(45:16):
my takeaway was cleanest major city I had ever been
to at that point, really beautiful, clean, Like it looked
like someone walked around and like literally cleaned the city
every day. That the Viennese, the Viennese and the Germans
are they run a tight hip fastidious people's Uh. It's

(45:38):
a one of the things I found interesting about this
movie is as they they talk in the commentary about
there was a three crews that worked you know, the
day crew that apparently didn't do much. There was a
night crew they were their money, that was busy, and
then there was the sewer crew, right. And it's great
because apparently Carol Reid worked all three crew it was,

(46:00):
and just left, you know, a few hours a day.
But he was just on on Benny's Oh I'm sure
it was on Benza drain. Yeah, you know back then
it was piped up speed exactly. It's just a prescription, yeah,
you know, yeah, that is nuts. Managing three crews is crazy.
But most of it takes place at night, and like

(46:21):
the city itself, it's like a character because it's bombed out,
which is really striking to see these beautiful buildings and
some of them, like retinic store, would be rubble. Um.
There's a German term for that apparently about post war movies.
And wrote it down. What is it now, I'll find it. Well.
I think the DP Crasker did such a great job

(46:43):
to just i mean the lighting of it. I mean,
you know, he was big into German expressionism, so what
a great movie to basically to use it on. I mean,
it's like there's piles of rubble everywhere, so you can
just stick a light behind that pile of rubble, and
which is why you wanted to shoot there, make a
giant shadow wherever, you know, the whites can be wherever
you want to. It was I think it was truffle
film and it was rubble films what the Germans called them.

(47:07):
It's definitely a rubble very interesting. Uh. And there's never
anyone on the streets too. It looks like they just
shut down the city, which adds so much atmosphere like that,
literally never even anyone walking around at night. Yeah. Then
well whenever there is a close up like those people
were actually local Viennese. You know, all those close ups
to those people, like you know when people people are

(47:28):
being chased through the streets and there's a face poking
out a window, it is, you know, someone who actually
went through the war there, and you know it's I
think this is one of one of the earlier movies
like shot on location like that. Yeah. Yeah, they didn't
do that much at the time. They're like, why why
are we going to Vienna? Yeah? What the way to
do it would be to shoot it on a sound

(47:48):
stage Los Angeles. It would be great, And that's what
Sellsik wanted to He fought them over that too, and uh,
as well as the actors. He didn't want Joseph Cotton
or Orson Wells in this movie. Well, actually, I think
Joseph Cotton was Sells next because he had him under contract,
believe it or not. Well, he wanted someone else earlier on.
I think he wanted James Stewart like that. Well, they

(48:09):
talked about James Stewart, they talked about no coward. He
wanted to Coward instead of Wars and Wells. And it's
hard to blame them for that. Give him what a
pain Orson Wells was, but boy, he just that gravy
tas man. He makes the movie face. It's so good.
Well it's funny too because it ends up re teeming
Cotton and or some Wells. You know. Even there are
two different producers were pushing for them for different reasons,

(48:32):
like they started the Mercury you know, theater company. So
it was and he was in three of his movies too. Yeah,
and there's kind of a comment. There's a misperception for
some people that or Small was directed at this movie.
And I think I thought that in my early twenties.
Well I did too, and there's also a um an
apparently very untrue perception, misperception that he kind of really

(48:56):
did though, like he's not the director, but he really
did while he was there, and that's not true at all.
It was all Carol Reid. And now he wasn't even there.
I mean he was, he was like two weeks late
for production and yeah, I mean he did, right, Um, well,
let let's get to it. They they exhume the grave
and it's proof now that Harry Lime is alive. Yeah. Basically,

(49:18):
they find the medical orderly who line was getting the
penicillan from, who it is actually the one that was
giving them evidence on Harry. They were I think they were.
They only hadn't arrested him because they hadn't didn't have
quite enough proof. And then he turns up dead. So
is the idea that Harry's killing all these guys? I
think so, because because he'd be him and it would
be the porter just straight up murder. These aren't like

(49:39):
kids that just happened to die because their penicillin wasn't good.
I think I think Harry is a murderer because because
even at the end when when when he comes in, well,
let's not go there, right, Anna is reported or on
her way to being deported. They bring her in at
leits alright, I've talked about that scene just for a second.
Is that when he pulls in callaway pulls are in? Yeah,

(50:01):
well the well, the four, the four, Yeah, military please
show up. They walk in. The Russian guy just stares
at herr and watches her change like she walks into
a shadowy corner and changes. He just stares at her.
Everybody else turns away. Then the English guy puts her
coat on her. She's I don't understand, and the American
cops says, oh, it's protocol, and she's like, I don't understand.

(50:21):
It's like, well, I don't understand either. And then as
she's walking down the steps, the French guy hands or
her lipstick. It's like that is like the most perfect
does and he's like, oh your lipstick. You don't want
to be arrested without your lipstick. Yeah, what a crazy
situation with four different countries. I mean to me, that
had to have been a joke too. I mean, just

(50:42):
I'm surprised, Allied. I don't know, what a clunky way
to do it. I guess that was the the turnout
of you know, basically everybody racing two lim cities first,
you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, so it's they have their
thumb in it or whatever. Yeah, we got here, but
we got here at the same time. It's a tie, right. Um,

(51:02):
so she gets called in, but they are are hauled
in and um then waylaid by Callaway. He basically it's
like listen, like, we know he's alive and we'd like
to get our mits on him. Uh, and basically asking
for her help. Well, I think what happens is is
he's saying that sort of lamenting and Holly the one

(51:23):
who says you know, says he would pay any price,
or Calloway says he would pay any price, and then
Holloway get or Holly gets the idea and says, well,
what price would you pay? So basically the word deal
he works is to set and are free and he'll
help them trap Harry, right, even though he needs money,
what he really wants is to get late. Well. I

(51:45):
also think at this point he's like he's seeing the
evidence and he and he's rise that right. Line is
not a good guy. Line is a bad guy, right,
But Honna is I mean, she's faithful to him. I mean,
as we will see later on which we're getting to.
But we're finally at the fair Wheel. Um, that is
the next scene where Harry. Uh it's funny when they

(52:05):
finally meet up. It's not like some big thing. He's
just like, hey, let's go for a walk, old friend. Yeah,
well it's broad daylight. It's the Russian sector where which
is the only place where Harry is safe oddly enough, Yeah, yeah,
you know, he'd be arrested anywhere else but law in order,
right even then, apparently the Russians were not big on that. Uh,
but yeah, it just shows up. They rid in the

(52:27):
ferris wheel, and I think, you know, he really tempts Holly,
like he's he's you know, talking about cutting them in
and all this. Yeah, he gives him the opportunity to
do the wrong thing. What Harry thinks is the right
thing is to make money. And then there's that weird
threatening part where he opens the door and Holly walks
over and like sort of wraps his arm around the

(52:49):
uh yeah, the post. So you know, he straight up says,
I have a gun. I doubt if anyone would check
a splatted body for bullet holes. Basically, so he kind
of threatens to on him and then it's sort of like,
I'm just kidding. He's like Dwight Yoakum in Sling Blade. Yeah,

(53:09):
he's It's it's amazing that that Wells comes off as
likable as he does, as long as he does in
this movie, because he really is not a He's the worst. Yeah,
he sucks. He's children are dying. He's straight up murdering people.
He threatens his friend, but he flashes that smile sort
of like he can't help but like him for some reason.
It's weird and calls you old Man, and you're like,

(53:31):
old man, I do want to read that. That bit
got the screenplay here. But his great monologue on the
Ferriss Wheel, Uh, he's talking about to set up the context.

(53:51):
Everyone he's talking about and acid tablets basically that he's
running out of that he can only get in America.
And as they're stepping off, he said, I wish I
had asked you to bring me some of these tablets
from home, Holly. I would like to cut you in
old Man. Nobody left in Vina Vienna. I can really
trust we've always done everything together. When you make up
your mind, send me a message. I'll meet with you anyplace, anytime.

(54:13):
And when you do meet, old man, it is you
I want to see, not the police, remember that, won't you.
So there's a threat. Then the next thing he says is,
don't be so gloomy. After all, it's not that awful.
Remember what the fellow said. In Italy, for thirty years
under the what is it borges Borges, they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed,

(54:36):
and they produced Michael Angelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance.
In Switzerland they had brotherly love. They had five years
of democracy in peace. And what did that produce? The
cuckoo clock so long? Holly so Wells wrote that that's
Graham Green even acknowledged Well, I think he lifted it
from somewhere, but it was his. It was right. That's

(54:56):
an honest contribution to the script. Yeah, and paraphrase at least,
So great man, I mean, one of the great monologues.
What's great too? I mean, and it's funny to think about.
I mean, Wells is dirty at this point, is he really? Yeah?
I mean jesus, how old is he memates as a
game like like it was like one cheese maybe twenty
three or something. I mean he was that's crazy. Yeah,

(55:19):
I mean he was washed up by the time he
was thirty five, wouldn't he Well, he was just Sowregon
difficult to work with it, right, you know he was
even Selznick didn't want him in this movie because he
was box office poison quote unquote, which he wasn't. He
was just you know, he was on set poison. Yeah.
I don't know much about the man. I need to
do a little orson Wells dive like I'm the person. Yeah. Yeah,

(55:43):
he's certainly fascinating. I mean he's you know, a lot
of great ideas that you know, he became less successful
the older he got. Like as a kid, who is
he to us? He was the Muppet Show and gallow Wine? Yeah,
which have you seen those outakes when he's bombed on
set of the commercial. It's really great. He's just hammered.

(56:08):
Oh man, I would I would give anything to have
been a p A. But my god, can you imagine
trying to think of anything that would have quit that
these days and all the people who yelled at me
when I was a production assistant, Mars Wells have been
one of them. Yeah, I would have loved to have
either been a p A on that or like the
camera a C for the Winnebago Man commercials. Did you

(56:29):
see that documentary about the Winnipeg Oh yeah it was great,
So good, do me a kindness, um, so that you know,
they have the great scene he leaves. Then there's the
train station seen. Um once again, Holly is just a
bumbling idiot. He puts he has her on the train
to safety, and then she sees him in the cafe,

(56:51):
wants to know why he's what he's doing there, and
then she figures out that he's he basically he got her,
he paid for her freedom by turning over on line
and and helping the police catch him. And so she
turns up her passport because he's like, oh, I guess
I really blew this one. Yeah, this dumb shit. It
didn't really occur to me as I was watching it,

(57:12):
like in another viewing after this talk like all this
stuff is going to be so much more apparent. I
think I didn't occur to me until many viewings and
when I was man well, even at the literary meeting
when the guy, when the guy is like asking him
basically he realizes that well, I'm is on the run
for a reason because the porter has been killed. Everybody
knows he's getting too close. So this guy goes to

(57:34):
the literary reading, you know, after the sort of the
fake kidnapping the deli, I mean, the bad guys do
show up and the guys telling him. It's like, he's like,
are you working on your next book? And he's like, yes,
I think I'm gonna call it The Third Man. I
just started working on it. It's about a murderer and
it's based on fact. And he's like, is it more
fact than fiction? Yeah, and he's like, I think you

(57:55):
should stick to fiction, and he gives him every chance
to say, yeah, you're right, but he says, no, it's
gonna be fact. And that's when he walks over there
and the two Goods. He's like, go kill him. Yeah, yeah,
that's right. What a dumb ship. Yeah, just god. So
he ruins on a leaving, he's ruining everything. This is
when he sees after. This is when he sees the

(58:17):
He gets led to the baby ward and sees the
sick babies, and that really seals the deal. Yeah, yeah,
that's right, that's right. He well, he tries to well
he changes his mind right with with Anna. Well yeah,
after after Anna refuses to uh to leave, he's like,
what's the point in and turning over on Harry? Right,

(58:39):
And so he's going to get on the plane and
on the way count away by the ward, which of
course where you see nothing. Yeah, there's no babies in
that shot. Yeah, I think I think that the only
thing you see is is a nurse turning a bear
over on its face or something. Yeah, like as if
this baby died, so like it doesn't need it spare
anymore on and so what do you do? He turned
the bear over? Don't watch bear? Uh? The sort of

(59:02):
a hamp is the way of dealing with that for sure? Well, yeah,
I mean I guess at some point you feel like
you have to show that this is an interesting thing
in the Solder Brig Gilboy thing is that you know,
as a writer, that is a motivation too to do
the right thing. Let you see what the result of
what Harry's done. It's like, how can you just say, oh,
it's just you know, a small black market scheme that

(59:23):
didn't have any victims. Yeah, yeah, victim mut's crime, so
you know not so that you know this now he's
once again, he's he's finally going to do the right thing,
to do the right thing. He's going to turn in
Harry because of what he did not to get honor free. Right.
This seems like one of those films too, that he
bumbles his way to the end to finally do the
right thing for the right reason, and it takes the

(59:43):
whole movie to get the American to do the right
thing for the right reason. Um, this seems like a
film that every time you see it you probably pick
up on just like twenty new things. Yeah, it's kind
of like the Maltese Maltese Falcon just keeps the givings
like I always do. You know, Yeah, I love that.
That's the mark of a great film. Uh. Well, then
we get to the final iconic chase through the sewer,

(01:00:04):
which really lives up to its billing. It's sort of
it's confusing, it's disorienting, there's there's no orientation to it. Well,
there's an interesting moment before that, like Holly, like Joseph gotten,
Holly is like going to meet him in a cafe
and uh and it's funny. It's funny because the police
are everywhere in the shadows and the drunk balloon guy

(01:00:25):
comes around the corner, like sells a balloon to the
guys who are hiding in the shadows. There's tons of
jokes in there, and then Anna shows up and I
think at that point that's when Norsemills comes in the
back door and he overhears Anna saying basically calling Holly,
you know, say are you happy that you're you know,
a stool pitch and now place, and he starts telling

(01:00:45):
Anna to get all the way because he's gonna shoot Holly, right,
which I always thought I didn't really, I don't remember
that from seeing a long time ago. But it's like
he's gonna shoot him. Yeah, yeah he was, wouldn't he
And that's the chase, and then they start right, yeah
he was gonna kill him. He puts that gun really
fast because he's like any get out of the way.

(01:01:06):
He's like yes for her. They yeah, yeah yeah, And
then they go drop into the sewers and um, like
I said, it's just very disorienting that you can't you
don't know, And I guess that's the whole point. It's
like you sense their disorientation to like no one. It's
not like they have a map down there. Everyone's everywhere. Yeah,
and at that point you sort of i mean Callahan

(01:01:28):
Callaway knows that he's using the sewers, that they got
copped everywhere. You know, it's you know what's noting ann
well for Harry at that point, there's that one great
shot where ah, where Harry is is stuck and sort
of the main channel and they're all the portals and
you just hear voices coming out of each one, you know,

(01:01:49):
a different accent, a different language even, and he's just
surrounded by like who knows, by everybody on all sides.
It's really cool shot. Wit weird that the people who
like the sewer police were white. You would think, you
think it want a dark color if he were the
sewer police and they had high boots too, and the
only guess his boots that was a very VNIs Venis.

(01:02:12):
And of course the dumb dumb is down there as
like one of the pursuers. It's like, why didn't anyone
just fucking like chaine him to a post us there
and it is arguable that he gets Pain killed. He's
the one that runs down there, and it's Pain is
the one running up who's his biggest fan, the one
guy who's the one guy in Vienna who's read his Western.

(01:02:34):
He comes running up to protecting me. It's like Mr
Martin's Mr Martin's and because he's not protecting himself, Harry
seah yeah, and then he pursues he's the loan pursuer.
In the end of Harry Yeah, Callawie, Callahan sort of
becomes as a Callaway or Callahan because it's a joke
in the movie. You know, like like Holly always calls

(01:02:55):
him one and he always like, it's Callaway. He's like,
it's Callawey, I'm not too irish something. That is the joke.
Now I'm looking right here it is. It's definitely Callaway, right, yeah, yes, maybe, yes,
maybe I can't see it. But it's like he's overcome
by by Sergeant Paine's death and sort of just's he's

(01:03:16):
totally out of it. In the meantime, Joseph Cotton picks
up the gun and at that point, you know, I
think Harry's like trying to he has his fingers through
the sewer grate, but it's out and he's been shot.
I think Callaway actually shoots him too, so he's been wounded,
and well he gives him that look the nod basically right,
it says kill me. I think he basically he was
telling yeah, go ahead, mercy, mercy kill me. Yeah. It's

(01:03:40):
such a great shot though, of his fingers coming up
through the grate and again a wet empty Venice, Venice, Vienna.
It makes you wonder if they invented the wet down
on this movie, because there's a shot of them wedding
down in the background. Did you see that Apparently the
fire trucks like like apparently being these were very very helpful. Yeah,
but I mean it shows it in a shot. Yeah,
And I Will was wondered if it was meant to

(01:04:01):
be here. Yeah, me too, if they saw that, I
was like, wait a minute, they're wenting the street down
and film once again. One of the things that that
makes it such a wonderful film to watch the black
and white and of course what you get with the
wet down is the any light is reflected in the streets.
Who won the Academy Award for this the DP Yeah,

(01:04:21):
what was his name, Crasker? Gorgeous? Is this the only
thing at won I think it is. I think it's
the only Academy Award, that is. Yeah, well he won
the palmtygor Oh no, well, Carol Read was nominated for
Best Director and uh film editing Oswald and he was

(01:04:41):
dominated before for the Fallen Idol to Carol Reid. I
mean it was. I mean, Carol Reid is an amazing guy.
It's his shame he I don't know why he doesn't
get more. I mean he was considered like Hitchcock, you know,
he was on that on that level. And actually later
on when the third time him and Graham Green got
thegether was for our Man in Havana. I don't have

(01:05:01):
if you've ever seen that, Alan guinnis and he's essentially
a hustler living in Cuba, and the the intelligence agencies
are looking to him for for help on what's going on,
and he just makes up, you know, all these crazy
things and you know, sends them diagrams of vacuum cleaners
and tells them it's a you know, a new weapon
they're working on, which is really that. That's an interesting

(01:05:24):
one to talk about too, because I think Fidel Castro
actually came to set. It was right after the revolution.
Castro actually came to the set when they were making
that movie. Uh, that's crazy, nutty, but that was a
movie that Hitchcock was interested in making. And Graham Green
was that was apparently not a big fan of Hitchcock. Yeah,
I saw that too. Carol Reid was Bee's knees by comparison,

(01:05:45):
He's the tits. All right, Well, here we are at
the end, Scotty. The last scene and last shot when
Callaway's driving Carol or not Carol Holly to the airport
when we will they go to the funeral, and the
funeral has got another good joke in it because you

(01:06:05):
see the priest like like rushing through the Oh that's right,
rushing through the sermon and takes the scooper during kind
of throws it down angry as if how many times
we have to bury this guy? Yeah that's true. But
they pass on on the road, and it's such a
perfect way to end this character. This guy's bumbled through
it all. Basically is like this should be the big

(01:06:25):
love moment where he's like dropped me off. I'm not
going to the airport. Yeah, he's gonna. He's gonna he's
gonna wait for Anna, who it's his last shot with her. Yeah,
and it's a really long shot too. It's it's it's
i mean three minutes long. Yeah. She walks down the
road a long long way, that beautiful center frame walking
down that tree line street. Well it's not tree line.
This is one of my favorite things. The trees are
all dead. There's no leaves on them, but leaves are

(01:06:46):
falling the entire time. So those are trees though, right.
I would give yeah, but I would give that anything
to see the watch out of that, because you know,
there are two ladders and like a deck on top
of the three p as up there just dropping. Yeah,
there's no leaves on the trees. Interesting, but yeah, she comes.
He just kind of very coolly. This is such a

(01:07:07):
way to in this character. Is he just parks it
by this cart and like it's like all right, I'm
just gonna wait for her to come up to me.
And she walked right by. Oh dude, and deadn't even
like never turns her head. I don't think nothing, not
even a not even a sneeze his way. It's like
he doesn't exist. He's so clueless too. I mean, and

(01:07:29):
Callgoy tries to tell him, he's like, give it a rest,
old man. Yeah, it's such a great ending, I mean
for the time period, just so very antithetical to anything
you would expect. Yeah, that's uh, well, I'll think you know,
that's it's once again it's a it's a noir. So
it's that that post you know that, Senise. And when

(01:07:49):
you think about the American public at this point, they
have gone from you know, propaganda and newsreels of the
war to seeing you know, sort of broken men coming home.
They seen a couple of I think there are a
couple at this point documentaries about what happened in the
concentration camp. So people are I mean it was you
know people, a lot of innocence has been lost. So

(01:08:13):
I think I think an unhappy ending like this is.
I think that's part of how this movie was made
to be. Just the tone of the movie is so
interesting because it is dark beams in the sense there's murder,
but it's always sort of happy and well and you
have this weird jaunty score. It's all very it all
subverts expectations, Like every time there's an expectation, something different happens.

(01:08:34):
I feel like, yeah, I mean for how and I
think Graham Green is the one who wanted the happy ending.
He was the one that thought yeah, and sells Nick
of course, yeah, they thought that Holly should get the girl,
and eventually Graham Green later on he did say that
Carol Reid was right and the downer ending, but he
didn't earn the girl, No, he was. It would have been, Yeah,

(01:08:55):
it would have been totally like bullshit, and it would
have been movie bullshit if at the very end of
him her showing zero interest, him showing her nothing to
attract her to him for all of a sudden, for
her just to be like Holly, it was you all along. Well,
what's interesting too, I mean, is to think about how

(01:09:16):
cynical she is, like she would rather just die than
he get away, you know, I mean, for sure, that's
a I think one of the things that one of
the things I enjoyed about this movie from a writer's
aspect is that Graham Green has a quote where he
talks about having like he always anytime he did script

(01:09:37):
he wanted to work from something. He said, he basically
trying to write from write something in a script like
it's such a such a sort of a naked shorthand
it was like he didn't find a way to put
characters or atmosphere into it. So he actually that's why
he wrote the short story The Third Man, and then
based the script on the short story he wrote, with
no intention of the short story ever being published years later. Yeah,

(01:10:00):
I got you, but yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, I
mean if he I mean he wrote other scripts though, right,
I mean that was his deal. He sort of, like
you said, wrote a bunch of different kinds of things.
It was a big writer. Somebody was telling me that
John Lacare is sort of a modern who is he? Uh?
You don't have the spy novels, John lad Sure? I
think so that he was sort of a you know,
the continuation of the Graham Greens were uh tone, I've

(01:10:25):
never read any of his books. Graham Greens are care
care okay, because you've read a few Graham Green, right,
I think I've read most of it. Yeah. I remember,
like twenty years ago, you're talking about Graham Green and
I was like, who, they're little skinny books. I like them.
Are they short? Usually you know, shortish? Yeah, that's good.
He's not reading doing any war in pieces. If you can't,

(01:10:47):
if you can't write a book in an under five
hundred pages, I think you got too much to say.
Sounds like you've got two ideas, not one idea. You
just like the sound of your own fingers diving. Well
that was great, dude. What what where should we go
next for our noir kind of ideas? Or you just
want to bat it around off air. There's there's a
lot of good ones. I mean, there's you know, there's

(01:11:08):
a good one that's going to be playing at the
Midtowns in Tokyo. Twilight. That's good, good Asian war. All right, Well,
maybe I would love to see this on the big screen,
by the way. Yeah, absolutely, that's so if you ever
hear about it playing, let me know, because Midtown did
that Midtown here? All right, Well we'll talk about it
off air. We'll come up with another good film noir. Hey,

(01:11:30):
thanks for having me. This was fun. We should watch
this one together just to see what else. Yeah, we
want to out absolutely, yeah, we'll do it. There's so
many things. We'll wait for Ruby to get a little
bit older. Plus there's you know, if you're animal lover,
that's another great thing in this movie. There's there's cats,
I mean it really, there's a there's a bird, is
a rhino, there's Yes, there's really has it all the

(01:11:53):
only doesn't have his people in the street. There's a
ferrest wheel with no one on it all right, thanks dude,
Loloney Crush has produced, edited, and engineered by Ramsay unt

(01:12:15):
Here in our home studio at Pont City Market, Atlanta, Georgia.
For I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for my heart Radio,
visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows.