Orson Welles, disenchanted with Hollywood, saved his earnings from European films such as The Thin Man and Black Magic to scrape together enough to make this daring and visually exciting version of Shakespeare's drama of jealousy and betrayal. It was shot piecemeal in a haphazard manner between other acting assignments from 1949 to 1952, and the result is remarkable given its troubled creation. Welles himself plays Othello, with his old friends Michael MacLiammoir and Hilton Edwards - Irish theatre's equivalent of John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier - as the scheming Iago and Brabantio. Welles took great liberties with Shakespeare's text - such as revealing the ending in the opening moments - and employed flashy camerawork and dynamic editing to great effect.

©ipc tx. Film content from TVTimes