Three Gentlemen (1998)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Three gentlemen |
| Country of production | Austria |
| original language | Austrian |
| Publishing year | 1998 |
| length | 90 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 6 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Nikolaus Leytner |
| script |
Nikolaus Leytner Max Linder |
| music | Haindling , the dumplings |
| camera | Hans Selikovsky |
| cut | Andreas Prochaska |
| occupation | |
| |
Drei Herren is an Austrian film by director Nikolaus Leytner with the main actors Karl Markovics , Karl Merkatz and Ottfried Fischer . It was shot in 1997 in Wanzenau , municipality of Gars am Kamp , in Lower Austria .
The film was funded by the Austrian Film Institute , the Vienna Film Fund and the ORF, among others . Drei Herren came into Austrian cinemas in November 1998 and reached a little more than 100,000 viewers. In May 2000 the film was broadcast for the first time on ORF, in February 2001 the German first broadcast took place on Sat 1 .
action
Three inmates of a psychiatric institution in Austria are to be relocated. Before leaving, the psychiatric nurse warns the three gentlemen not to have any complaints about them. However, the bus driver suffers a heart-lung infarction while driving and steers the bus into a ditch. The three passengers managed to escape and set off on foot to a nearby village: Mr. Dölken (Karl Merkatz) has suffered from chronic insomnia for decades, collecting examples of the sleep of many people on tape. Mr. Ivo (Karl Marcovics) lost his family in a car accident. He only speaks broken German and always carries a goldfish in a glass and postcards from all over Europe. The story of the third escapee, Sichel (Ottfried Fischer), remains in the dark because he doesn't speak a word, has a magnifying glass with him and only consumes his sausage rolls. Mr. Sichel is dragging the unconscious chauffeur around on his back.
The three appear one at a time in the village, so they don't attract any special attention. In this village a so-called “key man” is constantly on the move, who always opens and locks doors. Mr. Dölken intrudes on an old woman who is asleep and actually only wants to record sleep noises on tape. The elderly Mrs. Gstettner thinks Dölken is her son and believes that he has returned from the war. Dölken quickly nests with her. Mr Ivo enters the village church during a funeral and lets a runaway pig go with him. But the altar boy Wolfi smiles at Mr Ivo. Ivo also compares the modest buildings in the village with the majestic structures on his postcards. Mr. Sichel goes to the inn, where he discovers the goulash for the funeral feast and consumes it with huge appetite. In the meantime the gendarmes have got haze from the outbreak of the three gentlemen and meet Kamilla, the sickle is watching through the window. But Kamilla cannot give any information about three escapes. Then Kamilla befriends Mr. Sichel. Meanwhile, the funeral procession is having trouble crossing the main road as the cemetery is across the road. The carpenter Rudi Giesshübl is buried. During the funeral speech, a boy named Fritz asks the altar boy Wolfi, who is supposed to steal the relic of the village chapel as a test of courage - Wolfi rejects this suggestion. The funeral cannot be finished because of the heavy rain coming. Since Ms. Gstettner fears that her son will admit her to the home, she fled with Dölken to the luxurious house of the dead Rudi Giesshübl - although Dölken doesn't know why. Wolfi is persuaded by Fritz to buy the relic, the finger of St. Pankratius, to be stolen from the shrine. It quickly becomes clear that the inhabitants of the village have far greater psychological problems than the supposedly mentally ill.
Mayor Gstettner (the real son of old Frau Gstettner) does not find his mother at court and is beside himself. He is now already forming a kind of vigilante group in the village, armed to hunt down the three escapees - but since nobody knows how they look, the three remain undetected. Dölken, Ivo and Sichel now live peacefully in the house of the late Rudi Giesshübl. Sometimes the unconscious chauffeur comes to for a short time. When the village youth want to start hunting, Wolfi hands Fritz the relic finger. Fritz pocketed it. Wolfi asks him back shortly afterwards, whereby the finger crumbles. Wolfi now has to summon up all the courage to get a new finger quickly. The police officer mistakenly shot his finger off while hunting. This is eaten by Ivo's pig. Mr. Ivo already knows about the broken finger, because Wolfi keeps asking him for a new finger, but Ivo says no. Wolfi wants to cut off the dead Rudi Giesshübl's finger and opens the grave, but is caught by Dölken. Kamilla pulls Mr. Sichel to her father's court, where Kamilla's father thinks he is the new servant. During the work that Sichel is doing, the search party asks about the three escapees. Sichel claims silently that he saw her - and he is one of the three himself. Sichel and Peter (the squad leader) get into a fight, which Kamilla slows down by claiming to have had a Gspusi with Peter. Mr Dölken discovered a box of beer coasters at the farm and is thrilled about it. He then opens a large number of bottles to get hold of all the same lids to swap. Mr Ivo tells Wolfi about the accident he had with his family. The hunt for the breakouts seems to have been successful because the vigilante group captured the wrong three and tied them to the tree in the village square. These three turn out to be the notary, his assistant and chauffeur. The notary presents Rudi Gießhübl's will to the community, and it turns out that Ms. Gstettner had a love affair with Rudi and inherited his house. Meanwhile, Kamilla and Sichel are caught kissing, whereupon their father locks them in a wine cellar. Sichel proposes marriage to Kamilla, which she accepts. The old Mrs. Gstettner is passing away and Mr. Dölken is mourning her as if she had been his mother. Her burial is designed in such a way that her open coffin is placed in the stream and is supposed to swim as far as the Black Sea , as Mrs. Gstettner had never seen the sea. Kamilla and Sichel (called "Bärli" by Kamilla) marry quietly and without people at night in the chapel, but Wolfi hides behind the altar. His search for a finger ends with the fact that he sets the chapel on fire and has to be rescued by Ivo because the key man has locked the door. On her wedding night, Kamilla believes that Bärli (Herr Sichel) gave her a small fire with a glow worm, but it is the burning chapel. When the fire is extinguished, the villagers suspect the three madmen to be the arsonists. The next morning the chauffeur comes to and collects the three. The bus is decorated like a wedding car and before departure, Mr. Sichel speaks a word for the first time by calling for Kamilla because she is not coming. But during the journey she jumps to the back ladder of the bus and Sichel is happy. By the time the true identity of the three gentlemen is revealed, they have already traveled to another village.
Locations
Most of the village scenes were filmed in Wanzenau , but the manorial house was Mühlfeld Castle in Mühlfeld .
Reviews
“Drei Herren happily alternates between sentimental kitsch and stupid slapstick that is never stupid enough to endanger social stereotypes. Combined with an unimportant direction, this results in a film that looks like something out of a Sunday morning TV. Such comedies may lure some Austrians to the cinema out of pure nostalgia, but internationally, especially commercially, they hardly survive. "
"The result is a harmless, entertaining flick that can best be described as" lovable ". As a comedy itself, "Drei Herren" leaves a lot to be desired in terms of dramaturgy. The connection between the funny slapstick interludes and the melancholy humor hardly succeeds and the plot breaks down into episodes that do not condense into a whole until the end. On the other hand, there are brilliant scenes with wit, which show that Nikolaus Leytner has a great sense of cinematic humor. "
“If Drei Herren were the satire that the film seems to be, it would take snapshots that at least in traces are reminiscent of rural reality. Unfortunately, however, this film only reminds of the numerous accidents that happened to Austrian cinemas on its shore excursions. "
Awards
The film received the audience award for the Golden Beaver at the 1998 Biberach Film Festival .
Web links
- Three gentlemen at Allegrofilm
- Three men in the Internet Movie Database (English)
swell
- ^ Niederösterreichische Nachrichten (Horner Zeitung), November 4, 1998, page 8
- ↑ Three gentlemen at Allegrofilm