Der junge Medardus

This movie was originally released at length of 136 minutes. The version I looked at had 35 minutes trimmed, mostly, I judge, from the beginning, leaving some incoherence in the plot, derived from a Schnitzler play. It's 1809, Napoleon is at the gates of Vienna, and Medardus, played by Victor Varconi, is the son of a man dead in the wars. He is an Austrian patriot. He and Princess Ágnes Eszterházy are in love, but her ancien regime father orders her to marry the Valois claimant to the French throne. She does so, but puts him off until after he has accomplished a mission back in France. She sends for Varconi and tells him she loves him only, will he kill Napoleon -- played by a tubby Mihail Xantho -- pretty please and a cherry on top?

There's also an atlas that everyone is looking for, but I couldn't tell why. I don't think it matters terribly; the point of the movie is the costumes, the Viennese location shots, and the crowd scenes. Director Michael Curtiz is an absolute whiz at crowd sequences, whether they are battle scenes or the milling Viennese throngs. Perhaps those are actually the work of Second Unit director Arthur Gottlein, but I think not. Curtiz would, over the next couple of decades, run some pretty impressive crowd and battle sequences, in works like NOAH'S ARK and THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.

The historical drama is, of course, rather pointless, since Napoleon did not die in 1809 at the hands of an Austrian patriot, and the incoherence of the cut version only serves to abet the melodramatic nonsense of the story. Still, it remains an interesting movie for its position in Curtiz' curriculum vitae, demonstrating his assured visual settings even at this early stage of his career.

This patriotic Austrian costume drama, about the martyr Medardus who opposed Napoleon's occupation of Vienna in 1809, helped to earn Michael Curtiz (then Kertesz) his ticket to Hollywood and a long, productive career.

The plot proceeds in a series of confrontations with Medardus, his mother and sister, the blind exiled Count of Valois, his ambitious daughter, and Napoleon himself (portrayed as a cool strategist), including several brief flashbacks. The romantic element pits Medardus --the blond Mikhail Verkonyi,who became Victor Varconi in Hollywood, working often for DeMille and Borzage-- in a love-hate relationship with the Valois daughter. The result makes for tight-lipped entertainment, too steely and humorless to succeed as human drama, but interesting for Curtiz's handling of spectacle.

Curiously, whether in military parades or court pageantry or epic battles, Curtiz never once moves his camera. Each setup is cemented in place, although Curtiz stages plenty of movement within the frame, especially marshaling his armies in combat, adding inventive use of smoke effects, and ultimately achieving a genuine sense of spectacle. Only once, when the cavalry charges toward a ground-level camera, does this film suggest the dynamism of Curtiz's CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE. Also, from the director of Errol Flynn's most thrilling swordfights, a dueling sequence here offers remarkably disappointing swordplay, filmed in basic one-shots.

Among the numerous locations -- forests, the banks of the Danube, Schoenbrunn palace-- it is startling to glimpse the Josefsplatz, the square outside Harry Lime's flat which would form the epicenter of THE THIRD MAN a quarter century later.

In the end, the non-moving camera, combined with the enormous chunks of dialogue that clog the titles, suggest an illustrated text, elaborate but uncompelling, rather than the best of Curtiz's later work.

In 1809, while Napoleon is near Vienna, the duke of Valois ( Herr Ludwig Rethey ), aspiring to the throne of France and exiled in Austria, plots against the usurping Emperor. The son of the duke, Franz ( Herr Karl Lamac ), is in love with Dame Agathe Klähr ( Dame Anny Hornik ) and asks his father for his consent to the marriage, but he refuses it. Desperate, both youngsters commit suicide. The brother of Dame Agathe, Herr Medardus ( Herr Victor Varconi ), is seduced by the duke's mistress, Helene ( Dame Agnes Esterhazy ), who wants to use him as the instrument of her vengeance against the Valois family.

By then the Napoleonic troops enter in Vienna, soon in flames, and Helene incites Medardus to kill Napoleon...

That's the plot of "Der Junge Medardus", a film directed by the Hungarian Herr Michael Kertész ( afterwards Curtiz in Amerika ) in the silent year of 1923. Of course it includes aristocratic family conflicts ( the usual ones, that is to say, murders, vengeance; the kinds of things that aristocrats like so much ), based on Herr Arthur Schnitzler's oeuvre.

The film is a historical film production which means historical events are seen as important as aristocratic favourite subjects with their complicated feelings about primal sentiments. It was an important Austrian big budget film production as can be seen in many carefully recreated battle scenes and elaborate sets but except for aristocrats, money doesn't mean success… The film lacks emotion; it seems that Herr Kertész is more interested in illustrating historical events in a documentary fashion, using a static camera that films almost everything in long and medium shots; thus the action scenes are out of the action ( a terrible film incongruity ). Besides that, one has the feeling, especially during the first half of the film, that Herr Kertész is hurrying events. Such poor direction just does not involve the audience in the battle scenes or the court conspiracies. The film includes also just adequate performances, including Napoleon himself ( even though that French emperor has a tendency for grandiloquence… ) leaving to be admired only Herr Eduard von Borsody und Herr Gustav Ucicky cinematography. Due to the many important persons involved in the oeuvre and its big budget,, it should have been an artistic success but instead it's just an interesting failure.

And now, if you'll allow me, I must temporarily take my leave because this German Count has Napoleonic affairs to do.

Herr Graf Ferdinand Von Galitzien http://ferdinandvongalitzien.blogspot.com/