Talk:The Third Man

Length of the plot summary
Hello everyone. This note is to let people know that the plot summary (any movie plot summary) needs to be around 500 to a maximum of 700 words in length. Please be careful about adding prose to the plot summary as you can easily expand it past the maximum length. If you feel crucial items have been omitted from the summary, please try rewriting a paragraph rather than just inserting text here and there; words add up really fast! Also be careful not to do too much of your own interpreting of what is going on in the movie, as that can be subjective, and can count as POV. Invertzoo (talk) 20:58, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

Just wanted to say that it is a natural-enough response to suggest that TTM is such an excellent and complex movie that it definitely requires a much longer than average plot summary. However I believe that almost everyone feels that way about whatever movie is their individual favorite, and as a result, keeping movie plot summaries to a reasonable length is apparently a perennial problem here on Wikipedia.

I also wanted to point out that a plot summary does not necessarily have to be a blow-by-blow account of the scenes in the movie. I intend in September or October to try to draft a plot summary that treats the overall story rather than the sequence of scenes.

Best, Invertzoo (talk) 01:45, 19 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Although the film appears complex, the plot itself is not complex at all: it has a linear story line, unfolds over the course of a few days, has a limited number of characters and is only 104 minutes long - all pointers to a relatively simple plot summary. The Third Man can, indeed should, remain under 700 words. - SchroCat ( ^  •  @ ) 06:09, 19 August 2011 (UTC)


 * My head knows that Invertzoo and SchroCat are of course correct, but my heart wants every reader to bask in that story and its subtexts. The answer is to cede control to the stomach and get a sandwich. Thanks for your work, you two. — HarringtonSmith (talk) 12:27, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree entirely with you - it is such a rich story if feels more complex than it is. Adding a "Themes" section (or sub-section) to the article can lead to a place where the richness and subtexts can be examined in more detail... - SchroCat ( ^  •  @ ) 12:32, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I haven't caught up with any scholarly criticism resulting from the 1999 reissue, but the longer cut strikes me as more of an "Anna's picture" than the previous U.S. "Selznick" cut. As we mull over new sections — and do the research to support them — this would be an interesting vein to mine. — HarringtonSmith (talk) 12:41, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I thought I would amend the final sentence to 'Afterwards, with only minutes to catch his plane out of Vienna, he instead waits, hoping to speak to Anna, but she ignores him.' I think the point is that Holly has made some sacrifice to stay behind after the funeral, which makes her snubbing of him the more cutting. Any objection to this? Alfietucker (talk) 14:06, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes. It's a summary, not a blow by blow account of what has happened in each scene. The idea of sacrifice etc is a theme and it should be treated in a different section. - SchroCat ( ^  •  @ ) 14:15, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I would question whether explaining that Holly has missed his flight is only worth noting in a "blow by blow account", but will leave that for now. In the meantime I've had another look over the summary and as it stood there were a couple of corners which were unnecessarily foggy in their coherence, so I've taken the liberty of clarifying those. The word count is now 600, a good 100 below the limit. Alfietucker (talk) 21:58, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I've tweaked your last edit a bit - leaving some of the edits in there. I took out the bit about the "unexpectedly alarming taxi ride" as it falls into the excessive detail category and isn't needed. - SchroCat ( ^  •  @ ) 22:26, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

From the last edit by Heron - and judging from the history of editing of the "Plot" well before I arrived on the scene - I am not alone in thinking that the detail of Holly missing his flight is not incidental or "plot bloat". The point is this is the final throw of a man who has apparently lost everything else, gambling on gaining something by sacrificing his flight. Can we just agree to leave these few words in, given that I'm evidently not alone in thinking this quite crucial. Alfietucker (talk) 23:38, 9 December 2011 (UTC)


 * "Please can we discuss this rather than endlessly revert this point" - and yet still you revert... You then write that "The point is this is the final throw of a man who has apparently lost everything else, gambling on gaining something by sacrificing his flight" If this is not sheer and utter WP:POV then I don't know what is! Leave it in if you want this article to be a poor example of what Wiki has to offer - especially as it's in a one line paragraph...hideous!  -  SchroCat ( ^  •  @ ) 23:56, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll remind you of WP:FILMPLOT: "The plot summary is an overview of the film's main events, so avoid minutiae like dialogue, scene-by-scene breakdowns, and technical detail". As I said: leave it in if you think you prefer a weaker article that goes against the agreed article guidelines. - SchroCat ( ^  •  @ ) 23:59, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Just to politely point out, SchroCat, that since my getting involved in this I've only done one partial revert, as against your three; furthermore my one and only revert in this article was to partly restore someone else's work. Alfietucker (talk) 00:18, 10 December 2011 (UTC)


 * "Baron" Kurtz (Ernst Deutsch), Popescu (Siegfried Breuer) and Dr Winkel (Erich Ponto) are all black marketeers which is obvious from the lavish meal they are about to enjoy when Martins pays his visit to to Dr Winkel - the average Austrian at the time was on not far from starvation rations, this is emphasized when Anna states that at some of her theatre performances the audience throw tea. Martins is oblivious to all this and is unaware that Kurtz, Popescu, and Winkel are all crooks. The whole point of the film is that Martins is a naive but well-meaning innocent who blunders in among affairs he knows nothing about, ignoring advice from people who do know, such as Calloway, and in doing so gets the innocent porter killed and is ultimately responsible for the death of his friend Harry Lime. In short, Martins behaves stupidly and is dangerous to know. Even his 'friend' Harry Lime contemplates killing him - on the ferris wheel.


 * The film can be seen as Greene's allegory on the post-war US involvement in foreign affairs and countries of-which it was woefully ignorant and with its mostly well-meaning policies ending up causing unintended and generally undesirable consequences for the countries involved.


 * If you don't believe me, try watching the film again. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.24.215.49 (talk) 17:48, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Narrator — No Explanation?
The article states that are at least two versions of the film, differing at least by which actor performed the voice over.

According to IMDB, the two versions are described as follows:

"The UK version features introductory voice-over by the director Carol Reed; in the US version Joseph Cotten provides the voice-over, as his character Holly Martins. The UK version runs 104 minutes, versus the US version at 93 minutes, which was cut by producer David O. Selznick to give the film a tighter pace. Both versions have been released on video in the U.S., but as of today the most common is the longer British cut. A video comparison between the narrations appears on the U.S. Criterion Collection DVD."

IMDB also explains the two different narrations as follows: "When the film was initially distributed in America, David O. Selznick replaced the narration at the beginning (a necessity to explain the very unusual status of Vienna in the aftermath of World War II, when the film was set), originally done by Carol Reed himself, with a narration read by Joseph Cotten, in character as Holly Martins. Nearly eleven minutes of film was cut out in Selznick's version, including all references in the original cut to Cotten's Holly Martins being an implied alcoholic and anything else that portrayed him as a less than heroic figure."

I don't think of IMDB as a valid source (wikipedia might consider it otherwise), because there are no citations offered. I offer the information above only to make it easier on others who wondered why there are these different versions of the film. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.37.19.240 (talk) 10:30, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

And you know.. this is very strange, i always thought it was Trevor Howard's voice; made sense to me that Major Calloway would be telling this tale.. 'oh, I was going to tell you, wait..., I was going to tell you about Holly Martins...' 2602:304:CDAF:A3D0:5C2:339D:966C:338B (talk) 19:44, 13 October 2016 (UTC)


 * The narrator on the UK release is not Carol Reed but is actually Graham Greene himself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.173.13 (talk) 23:25, 23 February 2017 (UTC)


 * Reed had intended doing the narration himself but Greene was visiting the set at the time and so Reed asked him to do it, and Greene did. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.10.249 (talk) 10:26, 26 November 2017 (UTC)

Attribute the Jazz Music, if Possible
"Anton Karas wrote and performed the score, which used only the zither ...". NOT! When Valli and Cotten are in the bar, a strolling violinist plays. And in a later scene in a bar, with Cotten by himself, jazz music is heard for 30 seconds. 66.81.249.5 (talk) 21:01, 11 July 2015 (UTC)


 * The above is true; I just watched this movie yesterday and there is about 30 seconds of jazz music being played "live" as part of the movie. I don't know if there is a difference between music being played by characters in the movie, and music being played "over" as a "score", but it is a legitimate issue to raise.  Also I changed the title of this section from the ambiguous one-word title "Wrong" to the more meaningful title "Attribute the Jazz Music, if Possible"Jonny Quick (talk) 05:05, 3 August 2015 (UTC)


 * The jazz and other music is not part of the score. They are merely incidental.


 * The zither music was chosen because not only did Reed like Karas' playing but because at the time the zither was associated with European Jewish culture and the point of the zither music in The Third Man is that most of the Jews that had lived in pre-war Vienna were by the time of the film's setting, dead, having been killed in the death camps. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.247.9 (talk) 18:07, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 05:21, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The Third Man (1949 American theatrical poster).jpg

A new version?
I saw this film on TV today in which there was no zither music, and the first appearance of Lime was anticipated by showing his disembodied face earlier on. What has happened? Seadowns (talk) 22:46, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
 * – gosh. Literally NO zither music in the entire film? I cannot imagine this! Was the film otherwise as you would expect, ignoring the early Lime appearance you mention? I am quite baffled. A film expert – which I am not – might know where to look for alternative versions ... cheers DBaK (talk) 09:09, 23 May 2021 (UTC)

Cast
See Martin Miller (actor) for his role as head waiter. Spicemix (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2024 (UTC)