Synopsis:
In 1860s Macao, an aging merchant (Orson Welles) tasks his assistant (Roger Coggio) with finding a sailor (Norman Eshley) and a woman (Jeanne Moreau) who can act out an oft-told story of a one-night encounter.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

• Historical Drama
• Jeanne Moreau Films
• Orson Welles Films

Review:
Orson Welles’s feature-length — well, hour-long TV-length — follow-up to Chimes at Midnight was this adaptation of a short story by Isak Dinesen (one of Welles’s favorite authors), whose oeuvre Welles had hoped to tap into even more. It tells a simple yet very odd tale of a wealthy man:

… determined to make a sexual fantasy story come true (There really isn’t much more to it than this.) Welles’s assistant (Coggio) finds Moreau — who has a grievance against Welles given he is living in the house previously owned by her father, who committed suicide — and then Eshley to play the central roles in the apocryphal legend of a couple who experience an “earthquake” during their lovemaking.

To say more would spoil this almost-barely-there story — but suffice it to say, not too much else happens.

Note: This film was released in the United States on a double-bill with Luis Buñuel’s Simon of the Desert (1965).

Notable Performances, Qualities, and Moments:

• Willy Kurant’s cinematography
  

Must See?
No; this one is only must see for Welles completists.

Links:

• IMDb entry
• TCM Article
• NY Times Original Review (scroll down to second review)
• Village Voice Review
• Criterion Essay