BLACK MAGIC (1949) ¢ ¢ 1/2
D: Gregory Ratoff
Orson Welles, Nancy Guild, Akim Tamiroff,
Frank Latimore, Valentina Cortese, Raymond Burr
Orson Welles hams it up as a gypsy magician who cons his way to the court of the French king by hypnotizing a young woman who's a dead ringer for Marie Antoinette. He's too ambitious, though, and that's his undoing. Read this as a metaphor for Welles' own career and it becomes kind of interesting. Apparently Orson co-directed it (without getting a screen credit), and it's not hard to see why he'd be attracted to the role and the material.
