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Experience director Orson Welles' masterpiece Touch of Evil like never before in an all-new 50th Anniversary Edition DVD! Starring Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh and Orson Welles himself, this exceptional film noir portrait of corruption and morally compromised obsessions tells the story of a crooked chief who frames a Mexican youth as part of an intricate criminal plot. Now for the first time ever, see all three versions of the film – the preview version, the theatrical version and the restored version based on Orson Welles' vision. The Touch of Evil 50th Anniversary Edition commemorates a true cinematic achievement and is an essential addition to the very movie lover's library! Additional Features ------------------- Universal gave cinephiles a real gift when they issued a restored version of Orson Welles' Touch of Evil in 1998 (since editor/sound designer Walter Murch worked his magic after Welles' demise, the phrase "director's cut" does not apply). In honor of the 50th anniversary of the master's final Hollywood hurrah, they've upped the ante. Not only does this box set include the 96-minute theatrical release and 111-minute restoration, but the 109-minute preview version, which materialized in the mid-1970s (the rough cut no longer exists). All three feature audio commentary--two tracks in the case of Murch's edit. Critic F.X. Feeney comments in a conversational, yet authoritative manner on the 1958 print, noting that he prefers the original opening since it preserves more of Henry Mancini's percussive score. He also describes the border noir as "deeper and wiser" than Citizen Kane. Welles scholars Jonathan Rosenbaum and Joseph Naremore converse about the preview, which incorporates additional material by the filmmaker and Harry Keller. They feel that the relationship between cops Quinlan (Welles) and Menzies (Joseph Calleia) now makes more sense and that Menzies appears more heroic with the deletion of a defeated close-up. Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, and restoration producer Rick Schmidlin discuss the reconstruction, which Murch assembled according to Welles’ 58-page memo (the box includes a reproduction). To Heston, the old credit sequence was "grotesque." As Welles instructed, Murch moved it to the end. About the overhaul, Leigh enthuses, "I'm so grateful that his legacy will now be represented in the proper way." On the second track, Schmidlin offers a more detailed analysis. The package concludes with the trailer and a two-part oral history featuring Heston, Leigh, Murch, and others who helped Welles transform pulp material into a work that, in his own words, could prove to be "irresistibly interesting." --Kathleen C. Fennessy