Quartile rating: 8/10 · 1 rating
Arrested for an unnamed crime, Josef K. is trapped in a surreal bureaucratic maze where justice is unknowable and guilt is assumed.
Welles's adaptation of Kafka's novel is a genuinely singular achievement — the labyrinthine, expressionist visual language (shot largely in the abandoned Gare d'Orsay) creates an oppressive, dreamlike atmosphere that is utterly distinctive. The bureaucratic nightmare of the plot is rendered with visceral urgency, and the wide-angle distortions and cavernous spaces make it cinematographically exceptional. Anthony Perkins is well-cast as the paranoid, hapless Josef K., though supporting performances are uneven. The ending, while faithful to Kafka's fatalistic vision, loses some of the novel's quiet devastation in its cinematic execution, feeling slightly abrupt. Novelty is very high — no other film quite inhabits this Kafkaesque register with such committed, idiosyncratic craft.