Much ado has been made about Joel and Ethan Coen’s legendary Twin Cities roots. From the cheesy Minnesota colloquialism in William H. Macy’s accent in Fargo to their magnum Minneapolis opus, the St. Louis Park epic A Serious Man, these two natives have never left their home far behind. But now, springing up in the […] Much ado has been made about Joel and Ethan Coen’s legendary Twin Cities roots…

Anna Schmidt finally has some good fortune coming her way, for what might be the first time in months (or years?): her passport issues have finally been resolved with the Russian authorities, as she’s kindly escorted by Sergeant Paine onto a train presumably bound for her native Czechoslovakia. But at what price comes her freedom? […] Anna Schmidt finally has some good fortune coming her way, for what…

The look that graces Holly’s face today is one of dynamic determination, that is to say, we can see Holly’s strong moral fiber working to change his personality and this expression is a sign of his change in character. The naive and romantic figure we have simultaneously admired and lambasted throughout the film thus far […] The look that graces Holly’s face today is one of dynamic determination…

Holly and Harry have finally disembarked from the Ferris Wheel voyage that has revealed so many disconnections and fallouts between them: in the time it takes to revolve once on Vienna’s Riesenrad, Holly and Harry discover (if they weren’t already aware of it) that their once intimate friendship can no longer be rekindled. With seemingly […] Holly and Harry have finally disembarked from the Ferris…

We catch Harry, master actor that he is, with a particular slackjawed expression as he gazes from the side of the Ferris wheel’s gondola. Holly has just charged Harry with something that must rankle them both at the base of their Catholic upbringing. In response to Harry’s nihilistic monologue on the inhumanity of all of […] We catch Harry, master actor that he is, with a particular slackjawed…

Holly’s look says it all: if he had any doubts before, he now doubtlessly considers his onetime best friend Harry Lime as not only a threat but a despicable human being, an amoral nihilist who has come to embrace the worst tenets of both capitalism and modern political warfare. On Tuesday, Jeremy succinctly recapped Harry’s speech on the Riesenrad, a dialogue sequence rightfully regarded as one…

A shadow passes over Harry’s handsome features, both literally and figuratively. The giant Ferris wheel, the Viener Riesenrad, is continuing its orbit and the gondola that he and Holly occupy is continuing its ascent above the no-longer-abandoned park, Vienna’s Prater. As the gondola falls into the shadow of one of the abstracted steel pylons that […] A shadow passes over Harry’s handsome features…

Although Harry Lime has, as Jeremy pointed out on Tuesday, already made several fleeting appearances in The Third Man, today’s still is the first time we see him as a flesh-and-blood human being, awkwardly posed mid-sentence, interacting with Holly Martins in a more-than-spectral manner for the first time. Of course, this is also the first scene in which we hear Orson Welles’ mellifluous speaking…

This is our third glimpse of Harry Lime, aside from his shoes and his shadow, and it is certainly a glimpse and no more. (In case you don’t remember, here is his first appearance and his second.) His figure is the one half-hidden behind a pole from the carousel, the same carousel he will disappear […] This is our third glimpse of Harry Lime, aside from his shoes and his shadow, and it is certainly a…