The trial: A film by Orson Welles;

by Orson Welles

English, French (translation)

Genres: Fiction, Plays, Film

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1970

About the author

George Orson Welles, best known as Orson Welles, (May 06, 1915 - October 10, 1985) was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio.

Noted for his innovative dramatic productions as well as his distinctive voice and personality, Welles is widely acknowledged as one of the most accomplished dramatic artists of the twentieth century, especially for his significant and influential early work—despite his notoriously contentious relationship with Hollywood.

His distinctive directorial style featured layered, nonlinear narrative forms, innovative uses of lighting such as chiaroscuro, unique camera angles, sound techniques borrowed from radio, deep focus shots, and long takes.

Welles's long career in film is noted for his struggle for artistic control in the face of pressure from studios. Many of his films were heavily edited and others left unreleased. He has been praised as a major creative force and as "the ultimate auteur."

After directing a number of high-profile theatrical productions in his early twenties, including an innovative adaptation of Macbeth and The Cradle Will Rock, Welles found national and international fame as the director and narrator of a 1938 radio adaptation of H. G. Wells's novel The War of the Worlds performed for the radio drama anthology series Mercury Theatre on the Air. It was reported to have caused widespread panic when listeners thought that an invasion by extraterrestrial beings was occurring. Although these reports of panic were mostly false and overstated, they rocketed Welles to instant notoriety.

Citizen Kane (1941), his first film with RKO, in which he starred in the role of Charles Foster Kane, is often considered the greatest film ever made. Several of his other films, including The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), The Lady from Shanghai (1947), Touch of Evil (1958), Chimes at Midnight (1965), and F for Fake (1974), are also widely considered to be masterpieces.

In 2002, he was voted the greatest film director of all time in two separate British Film Institute polls among directors and critics, and a wide survey of critical consensus, best-of lists, and historical retrospectives calls him the most acclaimed director of all time. Well known for his baritone voice, Welles was also an extremely well regarded actor and was voted number 16 in AFI's 100 Years... 100 Stars list of the greatest American film actors of all time. He was also a celebrated Shakespearean stage actor and an accomplished magician, starring in troop variety shows in the war years.

Reviews

[Realini Ionescu · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Trial by Franz Kafka has climbed one place since last July (2025) and it is now 20th on The Greatest Books of All time site - we have the term Kafkaesque from this classic, indeed, we have another two magnum opera, The Castle and The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka, included on the Bokklubben World Library (Norwegian: Verdensbiblioteket) list of The Best 100 Books of All Time – more than five thousand reviews from both lists, and others, are posted on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... and YouTube channel, where the macaws run the show
Kafkaesque has become Trumpian today? I wonder…


9 out of 10

I have posted a review of The Trial https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... and more importantly, I think I have lived in a ‘Kafkaesque’ universe, seeing that Ceausescu was the ruler in these parts until 1989, and even after his demise, it was still an absurd environment…

Alas, as I wonder in the first lines, Kafkaesque seems to have mutated into Trumpian, but let me try and say a few words about the ‘subject matter’, The Trial as adapted by Orson Welles: it was in the program last night, on the Cultural Channel of the Public Network Television – we are getting better than America on some counts
Meaning that they attack media outlets there – not that all is smooth sailing here – and they try and blackmail some into cancelling shows the Orange American Psycho https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... does not like, such as Jimmy Kimmel

Anthony Perkins has the leading role of Josef K., the man that has the officials coming to arrest him for no good (or any) reason, trying to extract bribes – which is now a thing in Trump’s America, where the ‘royal family’ is getting rich using means familiar in the communist regimes – ‘you will not need these clothes’ they say
“Kafka: now there's another man who can't tell a story, who's incapable of illustrating the slightest thing, or the most important thing, by action. I don't think I've ever seen so many abstract nouns in a supposedly narrative writer before…” https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20...

Magister Ludi Kingsley Amis was not a fan of Franz Kafka, and I am influenced by him, albeit I could say that Kafka is not an author I would choose now, and that is because as mentioned, we lived in the atmosphere, the repressive regime that is described in his books, so there is more than an uncomfortable feeling
Orson Welles has this amusing anecdote about meeting Churchill, maybe it was in Switzerland, and mentioning to the former prime minister that he tires to get some financing form this fellow, and he appreciated the fact that Winston Churchill had recognized him: when they next met, Churchill rose from the chair to salute

Citizen Kane https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... was for quite some time the Number One feature on the lists of Best Films ever made, it is still up there, unless, we witness some serious upheaval, and indeed we do, The British Film Institute has an unknown motion picture in the first place…unknown to this cinephile

[Binxoxo · Rating 2 out of 5]

I get that this is meant to be a play, and maybe I would have enjoyed it more with the accompanying visuals, but I highly doubt it. I found this to be quite dragging in the dialogue-reducing the actual novel to its more basic form and not really having a creative spin or twist to it. The metaphor of criticizing governments and the judicial system is so on the nose that it's almost a joke. Josef was not one that I found myself rooting for, considering he was a womanizing freak who had weird sexual encounters with his own mother and sister. I found myself being flabbergasted by this book multiple times but not in a good way. I had to put down this book multiple times to think about how I spent actual money and time to read this.

[Martyn · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well, this is a reading of The Trial that exists in the world!

[massmarketbareback · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't read this I saw it, but that counts.

[Cameron Krogh Stone · Rating 3 out of 5]

Funny, ludicrous and bamboozling.

[Alfonso Siman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kafkaesque Welles of Justice!