The English film journal Sight and Sound, summing up the American films of 1958, concludes that, "the most outlandish American picture of the year, Orson Welles' Touch of Evil, is more of a film than any of these." We concur. This outrageously flamboyant shocker shows zest and enjoyment, and delight in the playful, theatrical possibilities of the medium. The opening is a marvelous piece of trickery, the closing an absurd fiasco, and, in between, there's a stylized, shadowy, angled story about a corrupt police captain (Welles) who frames his suspect. The cast, assembled as perversely as in a nightmare, includes Marlene Dietrich as the madam of a Mexican bordello, Charlton Heston, Joseph Cotton, Zsa Zsa Gabor...(And if you've ever wanted to see prissy, pretty, excruciatingly untalented Janet Leigh get thrown off her all–American, high moral horse, you'll love it when the pack of black–jacketed males and females closes in on her.) (F)or the sets he used a real nightmare-Venice, California.

We present the reissue of Touch of Evil, restored using Welles's personal notes and featuring a remixed soundtrack and revised musical score.