Viennese girls
Wiener Mädeln (reference title: Wiener Mädel and Wiener Madeln ) is a film directed by Willi Forst in 1944 in Agfacolor for Wien- Film about the Austrian composer Carl Michael Ziehrer, who was also played by him .
This last film made in Austria during National Socialism was Wien-Film's first color production at the start of shooting . However, the film was only released in 1949, making it the last of eight so-called “ defectors ” in Austria - films that were made during National Socialism but were only released after the war .
action
The opening credits read: “The film was conceived, written and directed by Willi Forst. Dedicated to the memory of Carl Michael Ziehrer . “The musician and composer Carl Michael Ziehrer, who works in his father's hat shop during the day, has the opportunity to conduct his compositions in the Diana Halls in Vienna one evening. The Munk sisters, especially Mitzi, generate enormous applause. The following night Ziehrer composed the waltz Wiener Mädeln (Weaner Mad'ln) and dedicated the work to the young women.
Coincidentally, Ziehrer had to deliver a hat to the Munk house the next day and met Klara for the first time, the oldest of the four sisters. Ziehrer fell in love immediately, but was turned away.
He is supposed to perform a composition at a ball, and Klara supports him with her singing. The young musician, however, refuses to play roses from the south from the younger Johann Strauss . Klara then announced her engagement to Count Lechenberg without further ado.
When Klara, meanwhile married to Lechenberg, learns some time later that she owes Ziehrer's actions to an appointment with the artist agent Paradeiser, she sends Mitzi. The sister does not have a say at Paradeiser, has to audition and is engaged under the stage name Marianne Edelmann. In Berlin, Ziehrer meets Mitzi. The two work together from now on. When they start talking, they get married.
Ziehrer meets Klara again at an exhibition in Kristiania ( Oslo ). Since she believes that she has made the wrong choice in crucial situations in her life, her Ziehrer assures that her husband's great career as a diplomat is still ahead of her and that she and Mitzi have made the right decision regarding their marriage. Klara and Mitzi sing at the exhibition Ziehrers Wiener Mädeln and help him and his orchestra to win against the musician John Cross.
Production and Background
The shooting spanned a period from March 9, 1944 to March 26, 1945. The interior shots were shot in the Rosenhügel film studios and in the Schönbrunn studio in Vienna and later in the Barrandov film studios in Prague. The shooting was interrupted several times by air raids . Willi Forst delayed the end of the shooting in order to prevent his employees from being called up for the war. Curd Jürgens, who played alongside his future wife Judith Holzmeister, was drafted nonetheless.
According to the opening credits, the music was played by the Vienna Philharmonic and the band of the former Hoch and Deutschmeister Nr. 4 infantry regiment . Erich Meder wrote the lyrics . Hilde Konetzni sang The Most Beautiful Girls Live in Vienna and Dora Komar . Herbert Janecka and Alfred Norkus were responsible for the sound recordings . The buildings were executed by Werner Schlichting and Alfred Kunz . The clothes and costumes were designed by W. Alfred Adlmüller .
At the end of the war in 1945, part of the film material fell into the hands of the Red Army , which finished a 107-minute version of the film in 1949 by the Linse-Film AG, Berlin / East, and in the Soviet occupation zone from August 19, 1949 performed. Forst managed to have this "lens version" withdrawn and had the film, cut according to his intentions, premiered on December 22nd, 1949 in Vienna. In the Federal Republic of Germany, the first performance took place on February 3, 1950 in the Luitpold Theater and the Schauburg in Munich. On September 29, 1973 the film was shown for the first time on television in the ZDF program.
The “forest version” is archived in the Filmarchiv Austria , which contains the film and a. demonstrated in May 2008. The FSK released the film in a length of 113 minutes in 1949. The version currently available for television broadcasts lasts approx. 103 minutes (99 minutes for PAL TV).
Awards
- Graf Kolowrat Sascha challenge cup from the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education for the best Austrian film in 1949
Reviews
The lexicon of the international film spoke of a "musically lively entertainment film full of humor and joie de vivre", which is "out of date in the plot and sometimes very close to kitsch, but excellently played, lavishly equipped and brightly illustrated" (in the rororo- The 1987 edition said: "Lively played and staged").
John Gillet's criticism can be read in Christa Bandmann's and Joe Hembus ' book Classics of the German Sound Film: “ Wiener Mädeln is practically the swan song of Forst's operetta cycle; In 1945 the film must have appeared as pure anachronism. The spirited story about a lesser-known waltz composer, Carl Ziehrer, has the charm of the early Agfacolor, with its pastel tones, a memorable score and a typically Forst bravura finale: a musical battle between the bands of Ziehrer and (of all people) John Philip Sousa , between which dozens of couples move, which in a sequence repeat the ever-changing confusion between waltz and marching beat. "
In the Heyne film lexicon it was said succinctly: "Operetta shame, which only Willi Forst could stage so ingeniously."
Web links
- Wiener lasses in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Viennese girls in the Filmarchiv Austria
- Wiener Mädeln Illustrierte Film-Stage No. 586
- Viennese girls film poster at filmportal.de
- Viennese girls complete film at the Deutsche Filmothek
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Viennese girls on the filmportal.de site
- ↑ a b Viennese girls. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed May 3, 2017 .
- ↑ Viennese girls at kinotv.com (with film poster)
- ^ Alfred Bauer: German feature film Almanach. Volume 2: 1946-1955 , p. 87
- ↑ Christa Bachmann and Joe Hembus: Classics of the German sound film . Goldmann, Munich 1980.
- ^ Lothar R. Just: Heyne Filmlexikon . Heyne, Munich 1996.