F for Fake
In 1938 Orson Welles terrified millions of Americans with his radio adaptation of War of the Worlds (based on H.G. Wells), in which a seemingly regular radio broadcast was interrupted with the alarming news that Martians had landed on earth in New Jersey. Many believed the news to be real and panicked. Fake news avant la lettre!
Long before the broad discussion about fake news spread, Orson Welles made his peculiar documentary about "trickery, fraud, about lies", using his complete cinematic bag of tricks to demonstrate his mastery of the art of deception. The film pivots around the story of the legendary art forger Elmyr de Hory and his equally deceitful biographer Clifford Irving. The latter is best known for fabricating the "autobiography" of billionaire Howard Hughes, for which he eventually ended up in prison for seventeen months. No matter how reprehensible these scammers are, Welles cannot help but admire them to some degree.
