Bring back the Monarchy! Blu-ray debut for THE SISSI COLLECTION, Ernst Marischka's classic trilogy starring Romy Schneider as Princess Elisabeth of Austria

"Dated" does not begin to describe the look, dialog and attitude to film, history, royalty, family and just about else else on display in the THE SISSI COLLECTION, the five-disc set of Blu-ray transfers of the series of films that were international hits back in the 1950s and turned a certain 17-year-old actresses named Romy Schneider into an worldwide movie star. And yet it is that very dated quality, utterly unapologetic and in-your-face, that makes this collection almost shockingly enjoyable. These of-their-time blockbusters out-Hollywood even Hollywood's attempts at this sort of thing, combining the lavish with the charming in such perfect measure that unsuspecting viewers are likely to find themselves as surprised as they are enrapt.

The work of a writer/director named Ernst Marischka (shown at right), of whom TrustMovies had never heard, the films bespeak that ever-popular "timeless" and fake-historical kind of movie-making (Gone With the Wind is another such) that thrills audiences while sending critics round the bend. Marischka wrote some 96 works and directed 34 films, but none, I suspect, matched the success of these Sissis. And we're talking about a time in which no one had yet imagined CGI effects, so the crowd scenes here use actual crowds, while the pomp and circumstance on view offers so much glitter and gilt that any guilt you might be feeling simply melts away.

From the first scene in the first of the films, as we watch "royalty" in action, so charming, kind and lovable are these characters you'll wonder how and why the monarchy was ever allowed to disappear. SISSI, made in 1955, details Princess Elisabeth's coincidental meeting with Emperor Franz Joseph, played by Karlheinz Böhm, above and below, right (aka Carl Boehm: remember Peeping Tom?), their falling in love and eventual marriage. Any resemblance to actual characters is accidental, of course, but, boy, is the movie sweet, old-fashioned fun.

SISSI: THE YOUNG EMPRESS (1956) follows Sissi's travails as she tries to outmaneuver her dragon-lady of a mother-in-law while helping the country of Hungary turn its fealty toward Austria. She accomplishes both and lots more, while giving birth and holding the marriage together by, of course, remaining true to herself and her ideals.

In SISSI: THE FATEFUL YEARS (1957) , that nasty mom-in-law (Vilma Degischer, above) is still making trouble for poor Sissi, whose health deteriorates some. Still, she manages to do for Austria's Italian provinces pretty much what she did for Hungary, winning hearts, minds and probably other bodily parts, as well. (All three of the Sissi films contain a smattering of international/historical-politics-for-dummies to pass minimum muster.)

The collection also includes two more films: VICTORIA IN DOVER (1954) -- a German version of the Victoria and Albert love story, also starring Ms Schneider and filmed by Marischka -- and FOREVER MY LOVE (1962), a version of the trilogy in which the roughly five-and-one-half hours that make up the three films have been condensed into two-and-one-half and then dubbed into English. I have watched neither of these two "bonus" discs, but the three that make up the Sissi Collection are more than worth their viewing time.

As enchanted as viewers may be by this series, some older ones may find themselves musing on the great success of the trilogy, which came at a time when Germany was still recovering from its recent Nazi past and needed something to feel good about. So turning an Austrian princess into a heroine of the people was not a bad idea, and Ms Schneider could not have been a more delectable nor charming choice for the role. It must have nice to be able to forget the Holocaust, even briefly, by embracing an earlier period pre-Hitler in which everything on view appears quite heavily Christian. And then -- such luck! -- to have the trilogy embraced by international audiences.

Performances all-round are all you could want -- charming, reassuring, expected -- given the time period in which the films were made. The Blu-ray transfers are quite wonderful, as well. Capturing amazing detail in both close-up and the vast scenes of spectacle, the transfer occasionally offers up a little surprise -- such as Ms Schneider raising her arms to wave to her subjects and in the process revealing some armpit hair (European women of the 1950s had not yet collectively embraced the American habit of shaving).

In all The Sissi Collection proves a surprise treat with luscious, endlessly entertaining visuals. From Film Movement Classics and running a total of 600 minutes(!), the collection features the films in both their original 1.37:1 aspect ratio, and in eye-popping 16:9 widescreen (which I watched on our widescreen TV and found pleasing indeed. Bonus features include a 20-page booklet that offers a smart and engaging essay on the films by Farran Smith Nehme. Both the Blu-ray and the DVD editions hit the street this coming Tuesday, November 14 -- for purchase and (I hope) rental.

Claude Sautet retro at the FSLC ends with the rarely-seen MAX ET LES FERREILLEURS

I used to jump at the chance to see any new film from Claude Sautet (1924-2000), a filmmaker who made excellent use of some of the finest actors from two generations of French film -- Yves Montand, Romy Schneider, Michel Piccoli, Lino Ventura and later Emmanuelle Béart, Daniel Auteuil, Sandrine Bonnaire, Vincent Lindon -- and whose movies almost always seemed to capture life as it is, generally messy, and from angles/characters/situations we rarely saw elsewhere.

Sautet, shown at top and at right, also always made me think of his homophone (I believe I am using this term correctly), sauté -- that form of cooking in which all the ingredients are pan-fried together quickly, and moved rapidly around the pan to keep them tasty and never overcooked. You could easily apply this to Sautet's movies, often fast-moving ensemble pieces that catch their characters on the run, as it were, living (and sometimes dying) as best they can. There is a melodramatic element to his work that puts some people off, but which, since I enjoy a good melodrama, never much bothered me. Despite this, Sautet remained a subtle filmmaker (little in his work is overcooked) who always drew wonderful performances from his casts.

The Film Society of Lincoln Center's tribute to the movie-maker is currently in full swing, but there is still time to see a number of the films included. (You can discover the entire program here.) If you have never seen it, I would recommend above all the rest, Sautet's first "real" film (he made an earlier one as a director "for hire"), Classe tous risques (1960), which was shown this past Thursday (but the wonderful Criterion transfer of which can be rented from Netflix). This amazing movie -- part noir, thriller, family film, chase movie and soap-opera rolled into one wonderful mix -- features Lino Ventura (above, with gun) and Jean-Paul Belmondo (below, with Sandra Milo, in his first role after Breathless), and both men give sensationally good performances.

For those who especially want to learn more about this filmmaker, don't miss the documentary to be shown tomorrow, Sunday, August 5, at noon titled Claude Sautet or the Invisible Magic, in which, months before the filmmaker's death from cancer in July 2000, Positif film critic N.T. Binh and his collaborator Dominique Rabourdin had extensive audio interviews, in which the dying director discussed his body of work in sometimes candid detail. The conversations were then illustrated with film clips and combined with additional interviews with Sautet’s friends, collaborators and admirers to form this unusual portrait.

TrustMovies is sorry that he could not get this post up earlier, but he only yesterday saw the supposed jewel of this retrospective -- Max et les ferrailleurs (from 1971 and which translates roughly to Max and the Scrap-Metal Guys) which closes the Sautet program with a one-week theatrical showing -- the first it has ever received here in the USA. Unfortunately, it is not a very good film and is one of Sautet's weaker efforts, so I can better understand why it has not been seen here until now.

I don't mean to imply that there are not some very good things about the movie, starting with the fine performance of its leading lady Romy Schneider, above, who has one of her best roles here as Lily, the prostitute girlfriend of the poor pawn of a petty criminal, Abel (Bernard Fresson, below, right), who has the bad luck to cross the path of the film's non-hero, a nut-case policeman (the titular Max), played in his usual close-to-the-vest style by Michel Piccoli.

Basically the movie is about "entrapment," though the word is never used. Perhaps it was unknown to the French back in 1971, but here in the USA is was certainly known to us gays, who were forever being entrapped by our own police. In this story, no one is gay (or at least no one is "out"), but Max -- who has just arrived on the scene after a bank job has been pulled, with the robbers having escaped -- is determined to catch some gang, any gang, red-handed. Because he cannot get to the real bad guys, he creates a group of news ones who will be caught in the act and thus teach the actual criminals a lesson. Huh? Yes, and to that end he goes about tempting and finally inducing Abel to plan and execute a heist via the relationship Max has established with Lily by posing as a rich banker who fancies this very attractive young lady. Don't ask. (Thank goodness our cop comes from, and is estranged from, a wealthy family of vintners, so he can afford to live the double life he now leads.)

Max's entire plan does not even involve the gang of bank robbers whom the police know pulled that most recent bank job, yet Max is certain that simply seeing another gang of robbers caught in the act will dissuade the rest of the bad guys from their planned heists. Sure. And if the French police believe this nonsense (a few eye-brows are raised but everyone finally goes along with this plan), I have a certain tower in the middle of Paris I'd like to sell them. The premise, in fact, is borderline ridiculous. Even as Sautet and his co-writers unfold their tale, it begins early on to seem manufactured. Well, as I mentioned, this filmmaker tends to deal in melodrama.

Along the way the movie is full of stupidity holes: Why would the police assume that Lily, having been told by Max of the date that the bank will be rolling in money, would immediately run and tell the entire gang -- including, of course, the police informer (every gang here seems to have one), rather than simply telling Abel in private? In a sense, the biggest problem with the movie is Max himself -- despite Mr. Piccoli's fine work -- who is a character so thoroughly manufactured, back story and all, that when he and his plan go into action, the movie's plot falls into place like a line of recently-standing dominoes.

The wild card here, as it so often proves, is love. How you react to the film's finale will depend on how much you believe in the Max/Lily connection. For me, and again, despite the simply tremendous performance from Ms Schneider, this was just some more "manufacture."  Max et les ferrailleurs, newly restored and with new subtitles from Rialto Pictures, opens this coming Friday, August 10 for a week's run at the Elinor Bunin Muroe Film Center.

MADCHEN IN UNIFORM: Lesbian classic with Lili Palmer & Romy Schneider on DVD!

All girls, all the time, with nary a man on view (there was one behind the camera, however: Hungarian-born director Géza von Radványi), MÄDCHEN IN UNIFORM (Girls in Uniform, should you need a translation) sounds like a camp classic, and truthfully the idea of it may be. Yet the film, which itself is a remake of the original 1931 German movie, is good enough to escape that fate. Herr von Radványi was a journeyman filmmaker who, after WWII, worked in Italy, France and Germany before returning to Hungary, where he died in 1986. In this film, at least (the only one I've seen of his), he places the camera front and center and just shoots.  The result may lack style but certainly captures the story in front of our eyes.

A high-spirited adolescent (Romy Schneider), having lost both her parents, is enrolled in a German school for girls, where she makes friends (and an enemy or two) among her peers and the staff and develops a crush on one of her teachers (Lilli Palmer). She is not the only girl who has this same crush, and jealousy pushes the button that leads to the film's interesting finale -- one that goes neither too far nor not far enough toward its thoughtful conclusion. The film resists over-the-top melodrama, relying instead on a modicum of understanding and possible change to come -- and on the performances of its two leading ladies, and a third, Therese Giehse, who plays quite well the school's stern and (nearly) unforgiving headmistress.

Ms Schneider (above, just left of center and below, right), one of the most popular international stars of her day (whose untimely death at age 43 was a shocker) makes a delightful Manuela, and she is more than matched by the gracious and reticent Palmer (below, left) whose large dark eyes, great beauty and ability to communicate deep feelings were screen staples for decades. Looking at this film today, it appears to be an interesting transition between the tamer, earlier version and a tell-all/show-all modern work such as Loving Annabelle, supposedly inspired by those mädchen. 

The film captures life in a girl's school of this time quite well, and the movie ends up a period piece for -- actually -- two different periods. One is circa 1900, when the tale takes place; the other is late-1950s Europe, when the movie was being made.  As usual with movies set in past time, the hairstyles, make-up and body types (but not the costumes, which seem pretty accurate) tend to reflect more the time in which the film was shot than the time is it supposed to depict. Yet this odd mix works because both periods will seem pretty ancient to today's younger viewers. Consequently, everything may appear equally "historic."

Mädchen in Uniform makes -- at last! -- its American DVD debut this coming Tuesday, September 14, from Wolfe Video --  the premiere source for LGBT films.  Available at this point for sale (from Wolfe or Amazon, to name two sources) and for rental via Blockbuster (and perhaps the few remaining independent video stores), the film should have been picked up by Netflix and Greencine, as well. You might want to give either or both rental sources a emailed kick-in-the-butt and tell them to order it, fast. (You can "save" it to your Netflix queue, but that does not guarantee that it will be ordered by the company.)

*******

To find out more about how this film finally arrived on DVD (in this country, at least: It's been available in Europe for some time), we had a chat via email with Jenni Olson, shown at left, director of e-commerce at Wolfe Video, as well as a longtime LGBT film historian. Below, TrustMovies' questions appear in boldface, while Jenni's answers are in standard type.

How do you think the time frame holds up in this film -- from the standpoint of audiences who see the movie now? To my mind there are actually two time frames to consider: how we, today, view the real historic period (around 1900) in which the film is set, and how the filmmakers and audiences of the period in which the film was made (the late 1950s or mid-60s when the final was finally released here in the U.S.) imagined this historic period to be.

Yes, it is a complex set of time frames to be aware of. The most interesting thing to me is why this German production company decided to remake this particular film at that particular time. The original 1931 version is considered to be the first lesbian film ever made and, although it depicts the homophobic and repressive environment of the school authorities, it ultimately expresses sympathy for its lesbian protagonist. This 1958 version similarly comes away as a plea for understanding and is even more interesting because the role of the strict headmistress is played by German-Jewish (and "out" lesbian) stage actress Therese Giehse. It is so fascinating to watch her performance as she expresses her disgust of Manuela's lesbian tendencies ("She loves you in a very sick way," she says to the teacher, Miss von Bernburg) and then to see her come around to a more compassionate perspective in the end of the film.

Does the film make a nice transition point between the original  Mädchen in Uniform and later movies like Loving Annabelle, in which so much more can be shown and told?

Of course it has much more in common with the original than it does with Loving Annabelle. And Katherine Brooks is very articulate about the fact that Loving Annabelle is not in any way a remake of Madchen but rather is inspired by it. She really had the vision and imagination (and courage) to explore a contemporary version of the story and to try to make it even more satisfying for a modern lesbian audience. But of course Loving Annabelle also confronts the ethical/moral dilemmas of a teacher-student relationship as it delves deeper into the romance.

How was the 1958 version greeted critically and by audiences when it was first released? Was it seen to be a “lesbian” film in the same way that The Children’s Hour (original and remake) were also seen?

I know that it was unfavorably reviewed by Bosley Crowther in The New York Times when it had its delayed theatrical release in 1965. Mainly he goes on and on about he thinks the original (VHS art shown at right) is much better than this one and he barely says anything substantial about the film itself. I have never seen any other reviews of the film and obviously it was not widely released like The Children's Hour and other films of that era.

Are there any other “classic” films that you would like to see given a second chance, as Wolfe is doing with Madchen in Uniform?

What a wonderful question! There are so many important LGBT films that have never been released on consumer formats. The original 1931 Madchen came out on VHS long ago and I would love to see that available again. But it is not very likely. It is increasingly difficult for a vintage DVD release to make financial sense (with the possible exception of the Criterion Collection which does such a wonderful job of unearthing archival treasures). For all of you classic film enthusiasts, please do whatever you can to support the release of these films (including adding them to your Netflix queue to demonstrate that there is a demand for them).

We have worked very hard to make this Madchen DVD release happen (it took more than a year to track down the German rights holder). And at this moment, in fact, Netflix has not yet placed an order for the DVD because (despite an intensive social network campaign we launched last month) they say there is not enough demand shown to warrant them carrying it. This is a really interesting thing that people should be aware of — that Netflx does not necessarily carry all new releases, and that in many cases it is the smaller films that are the ones to suffer and not get the circulation they deserve.

Anything else you would like to talk about on or near this subject, while I’ve got you, Jenni?

I just have to say that, as a film historian, I am so excited by the rediscovery of older LGBT films. There really is a unique thrill that comes when we see this kind of evidence of our existence — from so long ago, so clearly visible front and center as a theme in a work of mainstream cinema. All of the little elements of lesbian desire in this film are just amazing to me. Again and again we see references to the girls affections for their teacher (and for each other) alongside continual dialogue about the proper ways for the girls to behave and develop into heterosexual womanhood. And great lines like: “You’re such a peculiar child.” There is a ton of really amazing dialog!

The other most striking thing about the film is that even in it’s melodramatic moments it never descends into camp. It really holds up as a serious drama with a terrific 100 per cent lesbian hero. I hope other viewers agree and will find it as moving as I do.