After a car bombing, a Mexican narcotics official and his American wife get tangled up with a corrupt police captain on both sides of the border. It's Welles' most ornate and excessive masterpiece, and it opens with the most famous tracking shot in cinema.
Touch of Evil is a 1958 crime, drama and film noir film directed by Orson Welles. This breakdown covers 4 techniques (3 cinematography and 1 narrative), each with the scene where you can see it. If you like how it is made, The Third Man uses several of the same techniques.
Moving the camera in 1 long, unbroken and carefully planned shot that follows the action through several spaces. You see how people fit into their world without a single cut.
How this film uses it
The opening crane shot has now been restored to the version Welles intended, with no titles over it. It starts with a bomb being placed in a car. Then the camera follows the car through the Mexican border town while Vargas and Susan walk alongside it. The take runs 3 and a half minutes without a cut, and it sets up every character, location and plot thread before the bomb goes off. No shot in film history was harder to plan and coordinate, and Welles pulls it off in a single take.
Where to see it
The opening crane shot. The bomb timer, the car, the couple and the border crossing all stay in motion in 1 take until the explosion.
Lighting a scene with strong contrast between bright light and deep shadow, a style borrowed from old paintings called chiaroscuro. How lit a character is hints at their moral or mental state.
How this film uses it
Chiaroscuro means lighting with very bright areas next to very dark ones. Russell Metty shot the film under Welles's direction, and no Hollywood film of the sound era pushes that contrast further. Hank Quinlan is almost always in shadow. His bulk comes out of the darkness and only half his face is lit. The lighting lets you see his corruption. He is a corrupt man, so he stays in shadow even indoors.
Where to see it
Quinlan in the hotel room where he kills Grandi. The deep shadows swallow him. Wherever he stands, the lighting makes the place itself look corrupt.
Tilting the camera sideways so the horizon runs diagonally across the frame. The crooked picture makes a scene feel unstable, uneasy or morally off.
How this film uses it
A Dutch angle is a shot where the camera is tilted so the horizon looks slanted. Welles uses extreme ones all through Touch of Evil, and the tilted look tells you how morally lost everyone is. In this border town, you can't tell law from crime. People drift between 2 national identities, and the detective is also the criminal. The tilted frames never let you feel like you're on stable ground.
Where to see it
The interrogation sequences. The extreme tilts make the police themselves look unsteady. Through the camera, the film is telling you that nobody here stands on level ground.
Telling the story through a character you can't trust, because they are lying, mentally unwell or fooling themselves. At some point, you have to rethink what you were told.
How this film uses it
Quinlan is introduced as an experienced lawman. Then you find out he plants evidence, commits murder and has been corrupting justice for decades. Early on, you see things his way (the confident detective reading crime scenes). The film builds that trust on purpose so it can take it apart. Looking back, you are no longer sure about anything Quinlan told you.
Where to see it
The revelation of Quinlan's planted evidence. Your sense of who is right and wrong in the film flips. The detective turns out to be the criminal, and you did not see it coming.
Questions
Touch of Evil: quick answers
What filmmaking techniques does Touch of Evil use?
CineCode breaks down 4 techniques in Touch of Evil (1958): Tracking Shot Choreography, Chiaroscuro Lighting, Dutch Angle and Unreliable Narrator.
Who directed Touch of Evil?
Orson Welles directed Touch of Evil, released in 1958. CineCode also covers Citizen Kane (1941), The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), The Stranger (1946), The Lady from Shanghai (1947), The Trial (1962), F for Fake (1973).
What films are similar to Touch of Evil?
Films that share techniques with Touch of Evil include The Third Man (1949), Fight Club (1999), Amadeus (1984), Chinatown (1974).
