The glass tower
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The glass tower |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1957 |
| length | 105 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Harald Braun |
| script |
Odo Krohmann Wolfgang Koeppen Harald Braun |
| production | Hans Abich for Bavaria Filmkunst, Munich |
| music | Werner Eisbrenner |
| camera | Friedl Behn-Grund |
| cut | Hilwa from Boro |
| occupation | |
| |
The glass tower is a German social drama from 1957 by Harald Braun . Lilli Palmer , Peter van Eyck and OE Hasse play the leading roles .
action
The elegant Katja Fleming lives a life like in a golden cage. Her husband is the industrial captain Robert Fleming, a typical product of the economic boom under Konrad Adenauer. He asks nothing of his wife other than to look beautiful and be a good wife to him. For Fleming, a man of power, who is used to submitting to his wishes, his wife is just a presentable accessory. For Katja, this existence in hollow luxury is no longer enough. The former theater actress also wants to have a life of her own, to finally realize and live out her dreams, which she once gave up for her husband's sake. The illusory world around her, determined by abundance, which Robert created, depresses her more and more and threatens to suffocate her. Robert cannot understand Katja's growing dissatisfaction and rules like a patriarch. One day Katja's rescue appears in the form of John Lawrence.
Lawrence is not only attractive and urbane, he is also a writer, an artist like Katja too. Inspired by the young author who encourages her to rediscover and use her talent, Katja decides to return to the theater. Katja Fleming will soon be back on stage for rehearsals, much to the dismay of Robert, who leaves no stone unturned to put a lot of obstacles in her way when returning to her old job. The actress realizes that she has no future at Robert's side, especially since she threatens to fall in love with John. Fleming is not ready to just let his wife go, he sees Katja as his property. And in order to maintain this, he is not very squeamish in the choice of his means. When Katja wants to leave him, Robert tries to kill the new lovers. But the attack fails, and Robert dies in his attempted assassination attempt. Now Katja is accused of deliberately killing her husband. A lawsuit ensued, and the evidence against her was overwhelming. Nevertheless, Katja Fleming is finally acquitted. She can finally put an end to the past and start a new life at John's side.
Production notes
The film was shot in Munich and Berlin from July 12, 1957 until the following month. The world premiere took place on October 24, 1957 in Stuttgart.
Walter Haag designed the film structures, Hans Endrulat supervised the sound. The costumes are from Ursula Maes.
Lilli Palmer and OE Hasse were nominated for the film tape in gold in 1958 for their achievements .
Reviews
In its issue of November 20, 1957, Der Spiegel found: “Harald Braun, the director and scriptwriter who manages the ethical and religious issues of German film almost independently, this time wants to fight back the boisterousness of the boy's economic miracle. He locks a Berlin supermanager (OE Hasse) and his distraught wife (Lilli Palmer) in a dark labyrinth of glass and marble, a high-rise floor that is as luxurious as it is misanthropic. The proud post-war building, a Babylonian tower of the 20th century, is full of sleek, but also annoying symbols for the loneliness, presumptuousness, captivity, natural and self-alienation of the successful people in general and for the special torments of the extremely wealthy couple. The housewife's going to the psychotherapist and the suicide of the company owner are apparently intended to educate the dull moviegoers that all this splendor of today's wealth has been undermined. "
In Heinrich Fraenkel's Immortal Film it can be read: “A dramaturgically extremely skillfully built work, whose 'criminalistic' motifs of poisoning and trial appear at the very end. What remains essential is OE Hasse's design of the modern manager type, who in his 'glass tower' - the symbolic luxury covering of the former Berlin rubble - holds the woman who breaks out of this 'golden cage' of the ultra-modern kind, for her long-suppressed artistic talent and to develop your own personality again. A very important acting achievement for the Palmer. "
Bosley Crowther wrote in the New York Times on the occasion of the US performance in 1959 : “Much ado about a woman who wants to resume a career on the stage while her rich industrialist husband wants her to stay home and be his idle wife is made in the German film, "The Glass Tower" (...) The production and acting are superior, but the issue is flimsy and banal. "" The film 'Der Gläserne Turm', shot in Germany, makes a lot of ado about a woman who wants to take up a stage career again while her husband, a wealthy industrialist, wants her to stay in the house as an idle wife. Production and acting are outstanding, but the subject is weak and insignificant. "
"Effort, good actors and experienced directing do not hide the fact that even screenwriter Wolfgang Köppen could not change anything in the loquacity and inner emptiness of the colossal drama."
Web links
- The glass tower in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The glass tower at filmportal.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ The glass tower in Der Spiegel 47/1957
- ↑ Immortal Film. The great chronicle. From the first tone to the colored wide screen p. 452, Munich 1957
- ^ The Glass Tower in The New York Times, August 27, 1959
- ↑ Translation: "A lot of fuss about a woman who wants to resume her stage career, while her husband, a rich industrial tycoon who would rather have her at home than a good little house by the stove, makes the German film" The Glass Tower "(...) The production and acting are above average, but the subject is poor and banal. "
- ↑ The glass tower. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .