Ein blonder Traum

When one watches a very old film one has to expect something old-fashioned and rather fuddy-duddy. When one watches an old film the script of which was co-written by Billy Wilder one can expect something that is, above all, extremely funny and a pleasure to watch. Regarding this musical, my expectations were disappointed.

Two window-cleaners with identical first names, one decent, the other more impulsive, compete in achieving the favour of a young girl, who dreams of being an actress in Hollywood. That's the story, and as trivial as the story are the songs the characters suddenly break out singing. Moreover, the songs are also boring and schmaltzy rather than fast and funny. The same is true for the dialogues and the whole plot. The `comedy' part in the description `musical comedy' comes off badly.

The glorious Paul Hörbiger plays a part that offers him no chance to shine but forces him to hide his Austrian accent and say lines like `So ein Quatsch!'. Why on earth did he accept this role? Lilian Harvey, on the other hand, portrays the untalented artist with slightly too much effort. When she jumps around hysterically, we really want her to stay at home and cook.

By the way, it is not my misogynous opinion I'm expressing here but the tone of the film. Obviously, a touch of nazism slipped into the story at a time when the ideology was already present. Just pay attention to the `happy'-end of the film and to the title: `A Blonde Dream'. From this point of view, of course, the movie can act as an interesting piece of history. But for Sunday afternoon entertainment, it is much too dull.

Lilian Harvey spent years with a two-man acrobatic act that gradually failed. Now she wants to go to Hollywood to be a big star, but she can't get in to see the American consul. She falls in with poor window washers Willy Fritsch and Willi Forst, who take her to their meadow, where they all live in separate abandoned rail cars. With older Paul Hörbiger. But the two younger men, who are best of friends, are in love with her, and she makes another effort to go to Hollywood to save their friendship.

This is one of those French-German-English co-productions, with Miss Harvey taking the same role in each of them, but with the rest of the cast replaced. Willy and Willi do a lot of Laurel-and-Hardy style gags, and there are three songs, including a very sentimental one by Miss Harvey, who looks 15 years old here. It's sweet and funny, and this style of show has gone way out of favor. It's one of the virtues of movies, that they can preserve sorts of entertainment to show what people once loved. Billy Wilder was one of the writers, and while there are sparks of cynicism, it's a far cry from what he would eventually do.

This film is something of a forgotten gem. Biographies of Billy Wilder don't usually dwell too long on his time in the German film industry, yet the Wilder touches are apparent in the witty script of this terrific comedy. Example: Jou Jou tells the two window cleaners she was part of a novelty act called 'Ding and Dong'. 'Which were you?' they ask: 'I was the "and"' she replies - cut to a shot of the petite actress being flung about the stage like some human beanbag by two burly circus athletes. The two big musical numbers, 'We don't pay rent anymore' and 'Somewhere in the world there's a little bit of happiness' stand up well after all these years (they were written by Werner Richard Heymann, who went on to have a career composing film scores in Hollywood after the Nazi takeover in Germany). The lead actors are all on terrific form here - Lilian Harvey is charming, natural and never looked or sounded better, Willy Fritsch is at his boyishly likable best and Willi Forst, who went on to direct sophisticated comedies with much wit and flair himself, makes an able sidekick. The English language version retained Harvey, who was herself London-born.

While the politics of this movie certainly reflect the time, the script by Reisch and Wilder has a lot in it that goes beyond the usual Weimar/National Socialist transition films.

Forst is great as a self-involved cad who competes with his best friend Fritsch for the affection of Harvey's Jou-Jou (a showbiz wannabe whose last dime has been conned from her by a smooth-talker claiming to be a Hollywood big shot) The clever double entendre that one expects from Wilder is in the script as are some terrifically shot musical numbers.

One of the most innovative is a dream sequence that follows a train out of the city of Berlin under the Atlantic Ocean to NYC and across to Hollywood. The simplicity of a makeshift home in a boxcar is lampooned by a catchy number called "We Don't Pay Rent Anymore", and resonates for the Depression era. Then there is a wistful Lilian Harvey standard called "Somewhere on Earth" that also reflects the yearning for security and happiness that were prevalent during that globally unstable time.

All in all, this is a witty and enjoyable ribbing of hard times, big aspirations and love. The cast plays it to the hilt with remarkable chemistry from Forst, Fritsch and Hoerbiger. And, as she mostly always was, Lilian Harvey proves herself charming, lovely and one of the most compelling of the 30's film stars.

Time and care has plainly been lavished upon this trivial confection filmed on location in a summery Berlin in which people sing about keeping your chin up in adversity and the unimportance of money when one has oneself to rely upon, while Lilian Harvey sings, leaps about and breaks hearts with passionate abandon, and a melodramatic subplot involves a defective stepladder.

Did Emeric Pressburger draw upon memories of the dream sequence in which an obviously model train travels under the Atlantic from Germany to Hollywood for the similar sequence in 'I Know Where I'm Going!'?