Orson Welles' Unfinished Don Quixote Film to Be Reconstructed by National Archives

A collaboration between the national film archives of Italy, Spain, France, and Monaco will attempt to reconstruct Orson Welles' unfinished film adaptation of Don Quixote, a project that consumed him for over 30 years. Welles began shooting in Mexico in 1957 and continued intermittently until his death in 1985, self-financing most of the production with a small contribution from Frank Sinatra. His ambitious concept placed the 17th-century characters in a contemporary world, with scenes where Don Quixote attacks movie screens. After Welles' death, 91,000 meters of unorganized footage were left behind. Spanish director Jesús Franco assembled a version shown out of competition at the 1992 Venice Film Festival, which was poorly received. The article also details the struggles of Terry Gilliam, who finally completed his adaptation The Man Who Killed Don Quixote in 2018 after decades of setbacks, and the multiple failed attempts by Disney to produce an animated version, spanning from 1939 to 1999. Other successful adaptations include films by G.W. Pabst (1933), Rafael Gil (1947), Grigori Kozintsev (1957), and Italian directors Giovanni Grimaldi (1968), Maurizio Scaparro (1983), and Mimmo Paladino (2006).