Eric von Stroheim does earn his
reputation as a director. Despite the lavish production of his films, the
narrative is quite often fluid and smooth, without tiring the audiences. Even
the background music gives an impression to the audiences that they are
indulging in a ballet dancing, where the characters are always portrayed with
all their human faults, but with a pinch of sarcasm and humor too.
At the same time, he deals with love
in a romantic way, but not forgetting about realism. Another noteworthy point
of Stroheim’s films is that they always look modern, no matter if the setting
is in a distant era. This is probably because the audiences can still relate to
the feelings portrayed on screen and also due to beautiful wardrobe and
scenery, that are still a feast for the eyes and stood up the test of time very
well.
As an Austrian, Stroheim wanted to
show the end of nobility days and of gentleman values in Vienna, all of those
things coming to a brutal end with the beginning of WW1.
The setting of this film is Vienna,
1914 in the eve of WW1. Stroheim also takes part in this film as an actor,
where he plays the role of Nikki, a noble man in financial crisis due to his
spendthrift and the solution for him to recover financial power is marrying a
rich woman for her money. He is willing to do so, but things change a little
after the Corpus Christi procession, an important religious and military
celebration. The nobleman meets a girl (Mitzi) in the middle of the crowd and
it was love at first sight, even though the woman had a quite obnoxious fiancé,
a butcher called Schani.
Unfortunately, there is an accident
with Mitzi and the nobleman visits her at the hospital. Later, they meet again in the restaurant where
she works as a harpist. Love flourishes, but Schani is threatening towards Nikki
all along, which scares Mitzi and, in exchange for Nikki’s safety, she ends up
leaving him and the two lovers move on to their previous love commitments, Nikki
marries a rich woman and Mitzi and Schani remain committed.
After the two lovers having enjoyed
bliss and fulfillment through true love, their happiness is disrupted by social
obligations, a situation quite similar to the disruption of happiness in dear
old Austria before the horrors of WW1 reached the country. An entire lifestyle
was lost forever, but the memory of the happy days would remain forever in the
hearts of those who lived it.
No comments:
Post a Comment