The scarlet flower
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The Scarlet Flower (1935) The Scarlet Seal (1964) |
| Original title | The Scarlet Pimpernel |
| Country of production | United Kingdom |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1934 |
| length | 97 (German version 1964), 94, 95, 98 (English versions) minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Harold Young |
| script |
Robert E. Sherwood Sam Berman Arthur Wimperis Lajos Biró based on a novel by Emma Orczy |
| production | Alexander Korda for London Films |
| music | Arthur Benjamin |
| camera | Harold Rosson |
| cut | William Hornbeck |
| occupation | |
| |
Die Scharlachrote Blume (German release title 1935), Das Scharlachrote Siegel (German re-release title 1964), is a British historical and adventure film from 1934. Directed by Harold Young , Leslie Howard took on the title role of a noble adventurer.
action
France at the time of the French Revolution , 1792, during the reign of terror :
While in France the guillotine is increasingly setting the pace and costing countless people - guilty and innocent, poor and rich, aristocrats and commoners - the British aristocracy lives just a few hundred kilometers further west across the English Channel , untouched by it and drink. Only the young aristocrat and adventurer Sir Percy Blakeney does not want to continue to stand idly by as the revolutionary mob slaughters his French peers. He creates a second existence, that of the "red pimpernel", a freedom fighter against the tyranny of revolution on the continent. With a small group of 19 like-minded people, he rescues French aristocrats from the guillotine, including the Comtesse de Tournay and her daughter. In his daring ventures, in which he risks his own life every time, he always uses new masquerades. In his private life, however, in order not to attract attention, he presents himself as harmless and dodgy for nothing of the British upper class. Even his own wife is not privy to his double life.
His personal archenemy is the cruel revolutionary Citizen Chauvelin. At any cost, he wants to catch the mysterious liberator in order to finish him off. Robespierre gives him steam. He really wants to see the red Pimpernel captured and guillotined. So he appoints Chauvelin as ambassador of the French Republic in London. There he should use the opportunity to track down the aristocratic counterrevolutionary. Chauvelin is anything but squeamish in his choice of remedies: Without knowing that Sir Percy is the one he is looking for, he threatens his wife, Lady Blakeney, a born French nobleman named St. Just, to harm her brother Armand, who remained in France, if she should don't cooperate. Forced to cooperate, Marguerite unwittingly reveals clues that lead directly to her Percy. When Lady Blakeney learns what she has done, she travels to France after her husband to warn him about Chauvelin.
Chauvelin decides to use the captured husband of the Comtesse de Tournay and Marguerite's brother Armand, who is also arrested, as a bargaining chip and a lure against the red Pimpernel. Both prisoners are taken to Boulogne-sur-Mer. Despite heightened security, Sir Percy succeeds in bribing the two of them. But Chauvelin is soon on his track. Marguerite is also captured while trying to warn her daring husband in a tavern. It is true that Sir Percy can ship the two liberated nobles to England. But Chauvelin makes it clear to him that this is the end of the line for him because he has his wife Marguerite under his control. Percy is ready to trade: his life for his wife's. Chauvelin agrees. But the men who are supposed to execute Percy as firing squad are actually his own people. Together with his wife and his helpers, they escape to freedom on the ship.
Production notes
The shooting of The Scarlet Flower lasted until the end of November 1934. On December 23, 1934, the film premiered in London. In the following year it was performed both in Austria (March 18, 1935) and in the German Reich (a few weeks after the Vienna premiere), but also in Denmark, the USA, Mexico, Finland and Spain. On September 27, 1964, the film was shown for the first time after the war in Germany under the new title Das Scharlachrote Siegel ( ARD broadcast). In France, however, the performance is refused because the revolutionaries of 1789 are shown as brutal and bloodthirsty executioners.
With The Scarlet Flower began Walter Rilla his English career. In 1936 he finally left Hitler's Germany and settled in London. The film constructions are by Vincent Korda . Osmond Borradaile served the Hollywood-experienced US chief photographer Harold Rosson as a simple cameraman. Oliver Messel created the costumes for Merle Oberon .
"Pimpernel" is Sir Percy's distinctive mark; a type of plant called Roter Gauchheil in German .
synchronization
The following are the original German dubbing voices from the spring of 1935:
| role | actor | Voice actor |
|---|---|---|
| Sir Percy Blakeney | Leslie Howard | Walter Holten |
| Lady Blakeney | Merle Oberon | Rose Veldtkirch |
| Chauvelin | Raymond Massey | Hans Meyer-Hanno |
| Prince of Wales | Nigel Bruce | Will Dohm |
| Suzanne de Tournay | Joan Gardner | Antonie Jaeckel |
| Armand St. Just | Walter Rilla | Karl Schaidler |
| Robespierre | Ernest Milton | Max Schreck |
| Portrait painter Romney | Melville Cooper | Fritz Reiff |
Reviews
The national and international critics were full of praise for this film at the time of its premiere, but also after the Second World War. Below is a small selection:
Vienna's Neue Freie Presse reported in its edition of March 19, 1935: "This Korda film is, like the women around Henry VIII, made virtuoso and at the same time with subtle taste, with the directorial control of a tremendous scenic apparatus and at the same time a sense for the most delicate Here two effects of a rare kind are combined: that of the cultural and at the same time the detective and crime film in historical wrapping. In Leslie Howard (Percy) he finds an actor of refined nobility and elegant Sherlock Holmes dexterity. He seems like he does a Gainsborough to lead a brilliantly draped costume crime film to victory. "
The Wiener Zeitung of March 19, 1935 wrote: "The double role as a silly flaneur on the one hand and“ Lord Pimpernell ”on the other gives the English actor the opportunity to develop all his art. Merle Oberon, in the film his wife, Lady Blakeney, is not only beautiful, but also plays her role with mind and soul. (...) the direction ensures that the plot continues uninterruptedly, so that the tension continues uninterrupted from the beginning to the end. "
The Movie & Video Guide found: "Excellent costumer with Howard leading double life, aiding innocent victims of the French revolution while posing as a foppish member of British society". Translation: “Excellent costume film with a double life Howard helping innocent victims of the French Revolution while posing as a dandy-like member of British society.”
Halliwell's Film Guide wrote: "First-class period adventure with a splendid and much imitated plot, strong characters, humor and a richly detailed historical background".
In the Lexicon of International Films it says: "English comedy from 1934, which has retained its charm undiminished by the irony of the script and Leslie Howard's extraordinary representational art."
Individual evidence
- ↑ according to a short message in the Österreichische Film-Zeitung from December 1, 1934, page 6
- ↑ taken from Illustrated Film-Kurier The Scarlet Flower No, program. 2309 is located in the Film Archive Kay Less ago
- ↑ "The Scarlet Flower". In: Neue Freie Presse , March 19, 1935, p. 8 (online at ANNO ).
- ↑ "The Scarlet Flower". In: Wiener Zeitung , March 19, 1935, p. 9 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Leonard Maltin : Movie & Video Guide, 1996 edition, p. 1140
- ↑ Leslie Halliwell : Halliwell's Film Guide, Seventh Edition, New York 1989, p. 888. Translation: "First-class adventure film from the time with outstanding and frequently copied content, strong characters, humor and a thoroughly detailed, historical background."
- ↑ Klaus Brüne (Red.): Lexikon des Internationale Films, Volume 7, p. 3244. Reinbek near Hamburg 1987
Web links
- The scarlet flower in the Internet Movie Database (English)