Movies with a film-making background inevitably gain full attention from me, no matter how woeful their plots, lacking in skill their artistic pretensions, or miserable their production values. It's therefore most pleasing to find such a movie that is absolutely out-of-the-box in all aspects. Fedora ranks as one of the best movies-about-movies ever made. True, the mystery side of the plot is not exactly its strongest point. Although few members of a sophisticated audience would fail to grasp the obvious solution, the writers have neatly anticipated this problem by making the hero so desperate that he literally cannot see the wood for the trees. It's essential that we always remain sympathetic towards the hero, no matter how crass his actions, and this we certainly are as Holden brilliantly takes us through a replay of his role in Wilder's Sunset Boulevard. In what turns out to be the Swanson role, Hildegard Knef is also most compelling, and although Wilder was not happy with her performance, I thought Marthe Keller handled the title part with exactly the right edge of neurotic tension. Ferrer and Sternhagen contribute memorably forceful characterizations. Wilder's skillful direction is abetted by striking color photography from Gerry Fisher and a stirringly atmospheric Miklos Rosza score.
Review of Fedora
