Roman centurion Marcian is captured by Attila the Hun en route to Constantinople, but escapes. On arrival, he finds the eastern Roman emperor Theodosius plotting with Attila to look the other way while the latter marches against Rome. But Marcian gains the favor of Pulcheria, lovely sister of Theodosius, who favors a united Empire. As Attila marches, things look bleak for the weakened imperial forces. But the conqueror has an awe of the power of the Christians’ God…Read More »
An early short film by Douglas Sirk (Detlef Sierck) which takes a satirical look at dubious business practices during the Weimar Republic. It was banned under the title “Zwei Genies” but released as “Zwei Windhunde” after revisions were madeRead More »
Plot:
A young, impoverished German woman named Hanna (Maria von Tasnady) gives her infant up for adoption and emigrates to American to live with her husband. When her husband commits suicide, Hanna returns to Germany and works her way into becoming the live-in maid and nurse to her child being raised by an orchestra conductor and his wife.Read More »
At the end of 1970, the Filmmuseum in the City Museum of Munich showed a small Sirk retrospective (six productions from All That Heaven Allows to Imitation of Life). Fassbinder watched all of the films in this showcase and was deeply moved: “That really breaks you up in the movie theater. You understand something about the world and what it is doing to you.” This cinematic experience must have been a revelation for him. He described his impressions vividly in an extensive essay, and came to the conclusion: “I have seen six films by Douglas Sirk. Among them are the finest films in the world.” The young filmmaker went to visit the Hollywood veteran, who was now living in the Swiss canton of Ticino. And when the almost eighty-year-old director was teaching at the Munich Academy of Television and Film (HFF/M), Fassbinder took on one of the parts in an academic production that Sirk was supervising. (He played in Bourbon Street Blues, the film adaptation of a one-act play by the well-known writer Tennessee Williams). Sirk’s work experienced a renaissance, not least of all thanks to Fassbinder’s essay, but the influence Sirk exerted on him has nevertheless been somewhat exaggerated.Read More »
Encouraged by Fassbinder, with whom he became friendly after the then-enfant terrible of the German cinema visited him in Lugano, Sirk also did some teaching during the late 1970s at the film school in Munich, where he made three short films with his students. Sprich zu mir wie der Regen was the first of these films supervised by Sirk.Read More »
Quote:
Three years after the end of the Apache wars, peacemaking chief Cochise dies. His elder son Taza shares his ideas, but brother Naiche yearns for war…and for Taza’s betrothed, Oona. Naiche loses no time in starting trouble which, thanks to a bigoted cavalry officer, ends with the proud Chiricahua Apaches on a reservation, where they are soon joined by the captured renegade Geronimo, who is all it takes to light the firecracker’s fuse…Read More »
Synopsis:
A convicted murderer is being transported to Norwich for execution when a flood strands her and her guards at a convent hospital. During her stay, a nun becomes convinced of her innocence and sets out to find the real killer.Read More »
Synopsis:
The story of a young woman, Helen Banning, who travels to Munich in search of life experience and romance. While working for America House, she meets a famous symphony conductor, Tonio Fischer, and begins a relationship with him. She soon finds out there is much more to this man than his music, including a wife Reni Fisher, but there’s definitely more to the story, which she soon discovers. While dealing with the experiences life has thrown in her way, she is also being courted by Morley Dwyer a doctor from back home, who is currently practicing medicine in a Munich hospital. Who will she choose?Read More »
From All Move Guide:
Before he became cult director Douglas Sirk, Detlef Sierck cut his teeth on such lavish European star vehicles as Hofkonzert (Court Concert). Marta Eggerth is cast as Christine, a young singer who aspires to find out who her father was. Her odyssey brings her to the court of a mythical kingdom, where she is romanced by handsome lieutenant Walter (Johannes Heesters). He is warned not to lose his heart to a “commoner,” but all turns out all right when King Serenissimus (Otto Tressler) turns out to be Christine’s long-lost daddy. Hofkonzert was designed as a comeback for Marta Eggerth, whose star had eclipsed by the mid-1930s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie GuideRead More »