Vérités et mensonges (1973)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

Orson Welles

Writer:

Orson Welles (writer)

Release Date:

12 March 1975 (France)

Genre:

Documentary

Plot:

A documentary about fraud and fakery.

Plot Keywords:

Biographer | Breaking The Fourth Wall | Magician | Train Station | Fake Documentary

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Orson Welles	...	Himself
Oja Kodar	...	The Girl
Joseph Cotten	...	Special Participant
François Reichenbach	...	Special Participant
Richard Wilson	...	Special Participant
Paul Stewart	...	Special Participant
Alexander Welles	...	Special Participant (as Sasa Devcic)
Gary Graver	...	Special Participant
Andrés Vicente Gómez	...	Special Participant (as Andres Vincente Gomez)
Julio Palinkas	...	Special Participant
Christian Odasso	...	Special Participant
Françoise Widhoff	...	Special Participant (as Françoise Widoff)
Peter Bogdanovich	...	Special Participant (voice)
William Alland	...	Special Participant (voice)

Also Known As:

?: About Fakes (USA)
F for Fake (USA) (promotional title)
F wie Fälschung (West Germany)
Truths and Lies (International: English title) (literal title)

Runtime:

USA:85 min

Country:

France | Iran | West Germany

Language:

English | French | Spanish

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Finland:K-12 | Netherlands:12 | Sweden:Btl

Filming Locations:

Chartres, Eure-et-Loir, France

Company:

Janus Film

Trivia:

Hidden within a montage of footage of Howard Hughes is one brief shot of a man disembarking from a ship who looks similar to Hughes, but is actually actor Don Ameche.

Quotes:

Orson Welles: Our works in stone, in paint, in print, are spared, some of them, for a few decades or a millennium or two, but everything must finally fall in war, or wear away into the ultimate and universal ash - the triumphs, the frauds, the treasures and the fakes. A fact of life: we're going to die. "Be of good heart," cry the dead artists out of the living past. "Our songs will all be silenced, but what of it? Go on singing." Maybe a man's name doesn't matter all that much.

Movie Connections:

References L'amore in città (1953)

The masterful legacy of the man who changed the history of modern cinema

"F for fake" stands for the last movie Orson Welles really directed and, as for many artistic legacies it's the final demonstration of the genius of the artist, becoming some kind of briefing of his entire career.

It's hard to explain this movie and why I really enjoyed because, as many other Welles's movies, it's full of surprises and twists.

Filmed as a Documentary, this film introduces us the personae of Elmyr, a painter who lives out of painting copies of famous pictures of Van Gogh, Picasso, Vlaminck and many others and making them look like they're the original one. Welles also introduces to us two more people; an actress and a biographer.

With many resemblances to Welles's own life, the director of such wonderful pieces as "Citizen Kane" and "Touch of Evil" plays with the audience some sort of magical trickery. What is real and what is not? If Elmyr is able to paint a perfect copy of a famous picture and fool the world greatest experts, is he as good artist as the originals he's copying?

Working as a perfect metaphore of Welles own experiences in art (he's not only been movie director but radio speaker and even painter) "F for Fake" remains as a perfect legacy of the ideas of one of the greatest and most gifted cinema artists. Don't miss it!