Plot

An elusive billionaire hires an American smuggler to investigate his past, leading to a dizzying descent into a cold-war European landscape.

From the lips of a dying man at a dimly-lit Italian dock, Guy Van Stratten, the disreputable American fortune hunter, receives invaluable information about the powerful financial titan, Gregory Arkadin. In high hopes that something good might come out of it, Guy finally approaches the cryptic multi-million tycoon, intent on exploiting him; instead, the ambitious opportunist finds himself mysteriously hired by Mr Arkadin, to reconstruct the history of his murky past before 1927. However, as the methodical detective scours the globe to put together the dangerously knotty puzzle, people end up dead, gradually closing in on Van Stratten, who now begins to shed light on this murderously difficult assignment. Are those cases linked together? In the end, has the reclusive magnate something to hide?—Nick Riganas

In Munich, Guy Van Stratten, a smuggler, is relaying to Jacob Zouk, just having been released from prison due to his critical illness, why he needs him to live, his life in imminent danger beyond his illness. The story is as follows. At the port in Naples, Van Stratten and his burlesque dancer girlfriend Mily came to the aid of a dying man just stabbed, he who quietly told them two names, Gregory Arkadin and Sophie with a Russian sounding surname, whose hidden story coming to light is worth a literal fortune. They discover wealthy businessman Arkadin is currently at his castle in Spain, and unable to get to him directly, Van Stratten goes through the one person Arkadin would do anything for, his daughter Raina Arkadin. For Van Stratten, what starts off as romance of opportunity ends up being true love. Raina is indeed able to gain Van Stratten access to her father, who is well aware of him by the time of their meeting, complete with a dossier about his life. While Arkadin doesn't much like him as Raina's boyfriend and was going to use that dossier to warn her, he does believe Van Stratten, a hustler by nature, would be useful in another context. With a pocketful of Swiss francs in 1927, Arkadin was able to build his empire that exists today. However, he remembers nothing of his life pre-1927, and "hires" Van Stratten to compile that dossier of that pre-1927 life of him in return. With Mily ingratiating herself in Arkadin's social circle, Van Stratten travels the world following the leads he has, speaking to anyone who may have known Arkadin and his association to this yet unknown Russian woman, Sophie. It is Arkadin's past that threatens Zouk, and now Van Stratten and Mily's lives, Raina the indirect and unknowing raison d'être of that threat.—Huggo

Guy Van Stratten (Robert Arden), American smuggler, leaves an Italian prison term with one asset, a dying man's words about wealthy, mysterious Gregory Arkadin (Orson Welles). Guy finds it most pleasant to investigate Arkadin through his lovely daughter Raina (Paola Mori), her father's idol. To get rid of Guy, Arkadin claims amnesia about his own life prior to 1927, sending Guy off to investigate Arkadin's unknown past. Guy's quest spans many countries and eccentric characters who contribute clues. But the real purpose of Guy's mission proves to be deadly. Can Guy survive it?—Rod Crawford <puffinus@u.washington.edu>

Guy Van Stratten (Robert Arden) gets the order from Mr. Arkadin (Orson Welles), to find out everything about his past, because he lost his memory. Stratten accepts, but when he finds out that all of the people he asked about Arkadin are getting killed, he tries to prevent Arkadin from killing him.—Stephan Eichenberg <eichenbe@fak-cbg.tu-muenchen.de>

Prologue: (narrated by Orson Welles) A small airplane with no one on board was flying along the Mediterranean coast near Barcelona . . . Opening shot shows an empty airplane in flight.

Credits roll.

At night, between the containers on a Naples pier, first we see a man running, then another, staggering, (Gregoire Aslan), who falls and we see a knife plunged on his back. Guy Van Stratten (Robert Arden) and his girlfriend Mily (Patricia Medina) happen upon the wounded man, and at once offer to stay with him and call for help. The dying man says no, no police, as I am dying anyway, in thanks for being good to me, listen, before I die I will give you some names that are worth millions. Find Gregory Arkadin, tell him you know about me, Bracco, and also about Sophie. In the confusion and noise of arriving police, Sophie's last name is garbled as Bracco dies.

Guy is arrested for tobacco smuggling and put in prison for three months. Upon his release, he and Mily resolve to find out why that combination of names is valuable.

Gregory Arkadin (Orson Welles) is a multimillionaire business magnate whose whereabouts are known, so Guy and Mily proceed to Cannes, but Arkadin has an enormous staff of bodyguards in charge of keeping riffraff away, so Guy can't get to him. Guy gets lucky as someone points out Arkadin's pretty daughter Raina (Paola Mori) to him. As he approaches, she is talking to her constant companion, the Marquess of Rutleigh (Jack Watling) and he says he is afraid to meet her father. Guy politely interrupts the conversation saying he would love to meet her father, and his daring strikes a chord with her, although she rebuffs his advances and warns that she is constantly watched by a large team of her father's employees.

Guy has a conversation with Mily, telling her he will follow Raina and make advances to her in an attempt to get to Arkadin. Mily is a voluptuous cabaret entertainer who finds gigs easily, so she will try to become an entertainer for Arkadin, who throws big parties all the time.

Guy keeps tailing Raina, finds out she will be driving to Spain, and persists in talking to her until she lets him ride along. On the ride, he is charming and she begins to fall for him.

At their destination [Segovia], where Arkadin resides in the spectacular castle [the Alcázar], Guy manages to continue courting Raina while seeing the sights and observing a night parade of black-hooded men doing penance. As he kisses her and she warns that her father will destroy him if he is proved a fortune seeker, he vows he will never ever ask her to marry him. This enhances his attractiveness to Raina.

Mily, meantime, sees enough that she feels jealous. If Guy is trying for a relationship with Raina, she will try for a relationship with Arkadin himself.

Soon after at a masquerade ball at the castle, Guy enters as a guest and Mily has wangled a singing gig. As Guy enters, the camera follows him and the scale and magnificence of the party are a shocking display of wealth.

Guy finally meets the mysterious billionaire Gregory Arkadin, and after a few remarks Arkadin leads him into Raina's cavernous bedroom to talk. He tells Guy he loves his daughter intensely and will do anything to protect Raina from unscrupulous, shady suitors. He shows Guy a dossier on his life, labeled Confidential Report, where Guy's many previous run-ins with the law and other unflattering facts are detailed. Guy is not intimidated but challenges Arkadin instead, claiming that if someone were to investigate Arkadin in a similar way, plenty of dirt would show up, and he himself would not look good.

After an instant of reflection, Arkadin offers Guy a deal, that he investigate Arkadin's past and prepare a confidential report on him. Arkadin claims he had amnesia and knows nothing about his own life up to the time when he found himself wandering in Zurich during the winter of 1927 carrying a briefcase with 200,000 Swiss Francs. After some arguing, Arkadin agrees to pay expenses plus fifteen thousand dollars at the conclusion.

Raina comes into the bedroom, and asks questions. In the upshot, Arkadin promises not to interfere with Guy's relationship with Raina as part of the deal.

With the names and the year 1927 as the only clues, Guy seeks out people who might have some knowledge of Arkadins life. First, The Professor (Mischa Auer) a tall, cadaverous, impoverished Russian owner of a flea circus, who sits alone in a tiny room caring for the repulsive insects, feeding them on his own thin arm, and looks attentively through a large magnifying glass at the probing investigator. Next, a very eccentric antique dealer (Michael Redgrave) scrabbling about an enormous shop filled with junk, authentic and fake. Finally a bookmaker, who gives him the crucial name of a Baroness Nagel who runs a boutique in Paris and might know something.

Arkadin not only has periodic contacts with Guy but also has his network of informers reporting Guy's activities. Arkadin arranges a dinner with Baroness Nagel (Suzanne Flon) in which he finds out that the baroness used to work undercover for the Warszaw police and that she was instrumental in disbanding the prostitution and white slavery operation of a certain Sophie, whom she recognized years later as a customer that came into her Paris boutique. Sophie travels to Paris every year for purchases in her shop, from her home in Mexico, where she lives with her now husband, a General Martinez.

In the meantime, Mily has been with Arkadin on his boat. Acting on her own, she reveals to Arkadin some of what she knows from her contacts with Guy, in a scene in the rocking boat. She is stumbling around the room, giggling and taunting Arkadin as the camera captures the rocking of the boat and mirrors the shakiness of her drunken state.

Guy finds Sophie's first husband, Oscar, a drug addict, living on a small boat. But Oscar gives no useful information despite Guy's maintaining him in withdrawal symptoms until he talks.

The mystery of Arkadin's early life is resolved in Guy's meeting with Sophie (Katina Paxinou) in Mexico. She had led a criminal gang in Warsaw in the old days together with Arkadin,. With Brocco, Oscar, Jacob Zouk, they ran a white slavery racket out of a dance studio, using poor and naive girls wanting to become ballet dancers as prostitutes. When the operation was broken up by the police the group was run out of Poland, with Arkadin ending up in Switzerland in the winter of 1927. Sophie admits she was madly in love with Arkadin. He was then Arthur Bahzi and shows Guy photographs to prove it. She says that the two hundred thousand Swiss Francs were hers and that he disappeared with them. Later in life she recognized him at a casino where he was having a good run. Unknown to him, she bet on his numbers and made a small fortune that made up for the stolen money, with interest, so she saw no reason to stir trouble, and decided to leave him be.

Guy receives a call from Arkadin, who, it turns out, is staying at the same hotel in Mexico. Guy reports some of what he knows and says he is returning to Europe to meet with Jakob Zouk, the last member of the group, who has just come out of jail in Munich.

Before Munich, Guy meets Raina. Meanwhile, Arkadin is back and there is another lavish party . Guy asks about Mily, and Arkadins staff show him a police document -- it seems that Mily has drowned off the coast of Mexico. Guy gets a sinking feeling, asks to call Sophie, but finds that she, too, is dead, as well as Oscar.

Guy then realizes that all of Arkadins old gang are being murdered, one after another, that Jakob Zouk is next, and that Mily was murdered because she knew some things, so he will be murdered last, to ensure there will be none to talk of Arkadin's earlier life of crime. Raina will thus be protected from potential blackmailers, from those who might have a moral claim on the fortune built from the stolen 200 thousand Swiss Francs, and her opinion of her father will be untainted by knowledge of his sordid past..

Guy, in a panic with the conviction that he's last on the murder list, as insurance for his own life, rushes to Munich to find Jakob Zouk (Akim Tamiroff), the last member of the gang, to hide him to keep him alive. Guy finds Zouk on Christmas eve, a decrepit old man shivering in a garret, with his memories almost totally gone, and unable to react to warnings that he may be killed. Zouk insists he won't say anything unless he gets his Christmas meal of goose liver with mashed potatoes and apples and onions. When Guy returns with such a meal, which he gets through the influence of Arkadin, he finds Zouk dead.

Guy now expects to be arrested by the Munich police for murder. He has a chance to stay free and alive only by telling Raina about her father's past before the Arkadin organization can stop him with his own death. He attempts to lose Arkadin by mingling with a Christmas service crowd in a large church. Somehow he makes it to the airport to get on a plane flying back to Madrid with a stop in Barcelona.

Arkadin follows him, there are no more seats in the plane, and no passengers are tempted by his last minute offer of large amounts of money to relinquish one seat. Guy gets on the plane while Arkadin fumes at the airport.

Arkadin secures another airplane, which he flies, trying to beat Guy. By only a few moments, Guy gets to Raina first, and tricks Raina into telling her father by radio, while he is still on the plane, that he has talked to Guy and that he is too late, even though Guy has revealed no details as yet. The radio goes silent.

Raina realizes that the phrase "too late" has triggered her father's suicide, and she leaves the airport in the company of her previous suitor, the Marquess of Rutleigh.