Jeff Hannah’s review published on Letterboxd:
I would imagine that most reviews or thoughts about this film are wrought with apologies. "Blackface wasn't as controversial at the time", "it's quite coherent for being shot in multiple places erratically over several years" etc. Ultimately, this is a Shakespeare adaptation so the most pressing question is: does it do the profound tragedy of the play justice? I think it certainly does. Perhaps the most tragic aspect of all this is how meaningless Iago's motivations are. He's destroyed all these lives out of mere ego and vague ambition.
For any film version of a play, there's also the question of if it uses the medium to augment the material and performances (or just distracts from them). Welles certainly maximizes the emotional states here with dramatic staging and close-ups, which were the highlight of the film for me. The action largely takes place in huge, alienating and beautiful spaces with long shadows draped over eroded stone and cold metal. The funeral procession at the beginning of the film looks like a death metal music video.
As for the performances, Welles is never better than during his first monologue where he explains to a court of gentleman how he wooed the fair Desdemona with his tales of bravery and survival. He's convincing enough later as a man driven insane with jealously but Welles is always at his best when he's playing a swaggering and romantic man of the world.