Touch of Evil - 1958

Touch of Evil, Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, Orson Welles, 1958 Giclee Print
9 in. x 12 in.

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Touch of Evil (1958) is a great American film noir crime thriller, dark mystery, and cult classic - another technical masterpiece from writer-director-actor Orson Welles. It was Orson Welles' fifth Hollywood film - and it was his last American film. Touch of Evil was the last great film noir during the so-called 'classic' era of noirs, from the early 1940s to the late 1950s.

Although unappreciated in its time in the US, a box-office failure, and criticized as artsy, campy, sleazy pulp-fiction trash, the low-budget film - in retrospect - has been ranked as the classic B-movie of the silver screen. (It was met with rave reviews in Europe, and won Best Picture at the Brussels Film Festival).

It was completely un-nominated for Academy Awards -- bypassed by the Academy that instead gave Best Picture honors to the frothy, somewhat distasteful musical tale of Gigi (1958) (with a record nine Oscar wins), about a young woman trained to be a courtesan of a wealthy suitor.

This great noir was shot on location in Venice, California rather than in the film's setting of Mexico (possibly the border town of Tijuana but called Los Robles in the film). The film's script, written in about two weeks, was loosely based upon Whit Masterson's (a pseudonym for Wade Miller - aka Robert Wade and William Miller) 1956 pulp novel, Badge of Evil.