The Third Man

 Around my writing adventures on Saturday, I squeezed in some time watching music video. The music was Anton Karas on the zither and the video was The Third Man, directed by Carol Reed and written by Graham Greene. It stars Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Trevor Howard, and Orson Wells.

Filmed in bomb-ravaged locations in post-war Vienna, the black and white picture benefits from the intriguing theme played on the zither and fabulous cinematography. Joseph Cotten plays a writer of westerns who is lured to Vienna by an old friend and the promise of a job. He arrives just in time for his friend's funeral.

He learns from the British officer in charge (Trevor Howard) of the international police headquarters in Vienna that his friend Harry Lime was a smuggler. Cotten investigates and learns that Lime was killed when a truck hit him while crossing the street. Two men were present and dragged Lime's body to the side of the road. Cotten finds it a bit suspicious.

The porter at Lime's old apartment tells Cotten that there was a third man.

When Cotten returns to the building for more information, the Porter's body is being carried out.

Before all that happens, Cotten finds Alida Valli who plays Lime's girlfriend.

She's an actress whose papers Lime forged. The papers show she's Austrian, but she's actually Czech, and the Russians plan to drag her back there. She would not like that.

Cotten learns that Lime was a real slime, who stole penicillin from the hospital, doubled it by adding water and made terrible profits while people, including many infants, died or suffered long and painfully before meeting death from the tainted drugs.

Cotten and Valli seem to have a potential for romance, but it never does develop in my opinion.

Eventually, Cotten finds (s)Lime (played by Orson Wells), who is inconveniently alive.

Cotten lets the police in on the little secret and Trevor Howard wants Cotten to set a trap for Lime. Cotten resists, not wanting to rat out a former friend. Valli thinks it would not be too good either for Cotten to help put the squeeze on Lime. 

 Cotten meets Lime and they go for a spin on the wheel. Lime is unrepentant for his evil doings and declines to help Valli whose deportation is imminent.

 Cotten gets Valli's passport back to her, so she can get away - but she doesn't go.

After Howard takes Cotten on an unplanned trip to the hospital to witness the suffering of the infants. Cotten agrees to help trap Lime. Vallie shows up unexpectedly and ruins the trap before it can snap on Lime, who flees to the sewers. Officers and dogs pursue him. He kills one of the British soldiers, but he's wounded, and they're closing in on him. 

Cotten finds him. There's a gunshot. Cotten returns.

There's another funeral for Lime (with the right body this time). Afterward, Cotten has Trevor Howard drop him off so he can explore the possibilities with Valli.

She walks on by. Apparently, in the words of Air Supply, the chances are all gone.

The film ends there. All in all, the zither music is the star. I've omitted a lot of details, so you should watch the film yourself. It's on Tubi.

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More importantly, I wrote some great stuff. Sometimes, the pressing of the letters on the keyboard brings amazing results. It began with a mundane description of the character's occupation and flowed seamlessly into the revelation of something greater--a sort of parable the character will come to understand later as he makes discoveries about the dystopian society in which he lives. My working title is: Bugs in The System -- of course, that could change.

Today wrote the Author's Forward and little of chapter one for a short work I'm doing about a chap named Nephi.