The Tragedy of Othello: The Moor of Venice

"The film itself is a strange experience, always visually interesting but sometimes difficult to follow (…) Rating: ★★★ (out of 4)" 

"Something odder than a masterpiece, Orson Welles’s 'Othello' is at once a credible abridgment of Shakespeare and a jigsaw puzzle that nearly defies comprehension (...) [A] brilliant, confounding movie" 

"The movie is a formidable intellectual achievement (...) Welles invested even the simplest of cinematic devices with a subtle but vastly affecting complexity." 

"[It] may well be the greatest Shakespeare film (...) Held together by a remarkably cohesive style and atmosphere" 

"Psychology isn’t only expressed by the fabulous gothic castles and in-camera framing, but by the fevered energy of the cutting, and by the spontaneous repetition of certain images (…) Rating: ★★★★★ (out of 5)" 

Orson Welles talking about the Moorish nationality, extracted from the documentary "Filming Othello"- "Just here I'd like to mention how it came to pass that we entered the lists of the Cannes film festival under a Moorish flag, appropriately enough I'd say for a movie on the Moor of Venice. But this, like so much else was not a clever plan of mine, but a mere whim of fortune. We started off by losing the French part of our official nationality, and at the end we had no nationality at all. OTHELLO was a movie without a country. Which meant that there was no legal way to export or import this movie either way. That pile of film cans I had come lugging into town had no status, thus no chance to join the festival, much less of winning it. Morocco then was a flag of convenience, like Liberia for a ship owner. OTHELLO was the first and last film entered into the Cannes film festival that had no national delegation. There was just me and those film cans. Now, here is how I found out we had won the grand prize, a little sooner than one is supposed to find out. Officially that news is broken the way it is with Oscars, only when the winner is publicly named. But several hours before the big event, when I was up in my room besides myself sweating it out, waiting alone, there came to me somewhat breathlessly the big boss of the festival himself. He looked distracted. He wasn't there to give out any information, but to get it. "My God," he said. "I don't know who else to turn to. Can you tell me what is the Moorish national anthem?" That's how I learned that OTHELLO was the winner. I didn't know the Moroccan national anthem more than anyone else, so the band played something vaguely oriental from one of the French operettas." 

"Welles turned the limitations into strengths (...) This is Shakespeare filmed with love and powerhouse enthusiasm, never with reverence (...) A very great film noir." 

"Welles genius behind the camera brings one of the Bard's darkest plays to life (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)"