The Trial

Josef K. is told one morning that he is under arrest. Nobody says what for. The more he tries to defend himself the larger the court becomes, and every door opens onto another corridor. Orson Welles wrote and directed, from Franz Kafka's 1925 novel. Anthony Perkins plays Josef K.; Jeanne Moreau, Romy Schneider and Elsa Martinelli play the women around the case. Welles himself plays the Advocate. It was budgeted at 1.3 million dollars and ran into money trouble during the Paris shoot. Unable to use the Boulogne studios, Welles filmed in the abandoned Gare d'Orsay railway station. He explained it himself: the gigantic nature of the sets is partly due to the fact that the only setting he had was that old abandoned station. The film opens with pin-screen animation by Alexandre Alexeieff and Claire Parker illustrating Kafka's parable Before the Law, followed by disorienting angles and unconventional focus throughout. Welles was unambiguous once it was finished: The Trial is the best film I have ever made. The first reception split and the assessment rose over time. Roger Ebert gave it four stars and Rotten Tomatoes sits at 84 percent. Criterion released a 4K restoration in 2023. Who it is for: viewers who like Welles and formally demanding films. Who it is not for: anyone looking for narrative logic. To keep Kafka's uncertainty the film deliberately keeps you disoriented.