Una llama mágica

Opulent film is terrific with Dirk Bogarde playing Franz Liszt in a totally memorable performance. Capucine, as the Princess Carolyne, and Genevieve Page, as the abandoned mistress, were truly terrific here as well as a fine supporting performance by Martita Hunt, as the Czar's sympathetic sister. Hunt literally made a career of playing strong, erudite women.

The set decorations here are phenomenal, they're on par with the great 1944 film "Wilson."

The music is magnificent although we could have done without knowing about the friendship between Liszt and the anti-Semite Richard Wagner. Another flaw is the miscasting of Lou Jacobi as Bogarde's manager. Jacobi sounded like he came out of the Catskills. This film for Jacobi came after his super performance, the year before, in the beloved "The Diary of Anne Frank." (Happy Birthday Lou as you turn 95 on Dec. 28th.)

The first part of the film deals with Liszt's career. His playing in concerts in various European countries was remarkable. The second part deals with his ill-fated love with the Countess Cathryne of Lichtenstein.

While we see that Liszt entered the priesthood when his proposed marriage to Cathryne was rejected, we really can't tell if Cathryne became a nun. I imagine no since she was still technically married in the eyes of the church. Nonetheless, we have a powerful, beautifully acted film. Too bad that Totentanz, a Liszt masterpiece, was not played here. I had to know that piece of grand music in a required music course at college. Like the movie, Totentanz was a masterful piece.

This is a very beautiful film made with great meticulousness and with a serious intention to for once stick to the truth in a biopic, and the actors are all superb, especially Martita Hunt as the Grand Duchess, the most convincing one. Dirk Bogarde is excellent as Liszt but not at all as he was, more like an English gentleman than the emotionally wayward and unstable victim of his own vanity with much confusion that he was. Capucine is spellbindingly beautiful as Carolyne carrying herself with great style, and Geneviève Page makes a very convincing Marie d'Agoult. But what about the others? George Sand makes a very brief appearance, Lola Montez is not allowed at all, and there were others. Instead of telling the truth the film devotes itself to the Liszt myths and embellishes them thoroughly, so that Franz Liszt would have liked it. Of course, this at least is preferred to the terrible character assassination "Lisztomania" by Ken Russell 1975 dragging it all down to vulgarity. At least, Liszt was never vulgar. On the contrary, he was very careful about excluding himself only to the highest circles of nobility, which the film conveys adequately. Still, it's not a great film, seconded by both the great Chopin films, like Liszt never came close to the genius of Chopin. The relationship with the Princess Carolyne is greatly romanticized, and Franz Liszt confessed himself that Marie d'Agoult was his only true love. Like Liszt himself, the film is gradually bogged down into his sanctimonious catholic penchant for superstition, he neglects his own life, music and love to follow the church and thus made a fool of himself instead of fulfilling his glorious career. Well, well. The film remains a most beautiful musical illustration to his life and enjoyable as such, while it leaves you deploring his bathos. The last third of his life (he became 75) was wasted getting mummified in the church with very few more compositions.

Franz Liszt back in the day was maybe the first popular musical icon. Since we have no phonograph records of what he sounded like on the piano we only have his music to judge him by today. Good thing he wrote a lot of it.

A Liszt concert back then if played for a mass audience was something like the reception that Elvis and The Beatles got back in their day. It aroused the jealousy of a lot of Liszt's contemporaries, but they respected his talent.

Dirk Bogarde is a capable and charismatic Liszt who had a weakness for married women. He ran off with one and had a couple of kids by her and then seduces a royal countess. The two women in question are played by Genevieve Page and Capucine.

Dirk and Cappy have a whole lot of hurdles to overcome before they can be happy, put there by the Romanov family and the Catholic Church, but it does sort of work itself out in the end.

My favorite performance in the film is that of Martita Hunt who plays a dowager German princess who offers Liszt employment when he needs it.

The film only covers a small portion of Franz Liszt's life, still it's a worthwhile biographical study.

Ferencz Liszt was by most accounts a kind and pious man who shared his talents and privileges of his fame with his fans, students and fellow artists like Berlioz and Wagner. This film does him an injustice by portraying him as a prima donna and Lothario. Nevertheless, the producers must be commended for making it. It aroused my interest in classical music when I saw it at the age of 10.

I thrilled to the bombast and impossible fingerwork of Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2. But the final piece Liszt (portrayed by Bogarde) played as he retreated to the monastery haunted me throughout my teenage years. Liebestraume No. 3 ("Dreams of Love") can either be a soothing balm or a cutting knife for the lovesick.

Bogarde, who obviously knew his onions about piano playing displayed the exact fingerwork on the proper fields of the keyboard and his body English was totally convincing. Well after all, he was not only an actor but a true artist - an accomplished writer and a painter.

Capuccine, touted as one of the most beautiful women at the time, portrayed the Princess of Witgenstein. But my heart fell for the jilted wife, the Belgian countess portrayed by Genevieve Page whom I found more,"simpatica."

Given the fact that this biopic is about one of the great classical composers, it's rather perplexing that so much of the music is by others. Even with those by Liszt, there are many of his transcriptions rather than original compositions.

I was expecting a comprehensive presentation of Liszt in a film devoted to his life and creative work. Less of interest were works by Bach, Beethoven, Mozart and others. The results looks like the film makers may have lacked complete confidence that a movie featuring compositions exclusively by Liszt would be that attractive to viewers.

In the event that's the case, it's no wonder the critical and public rating of this film is less than excellent. What's notable about it is the exquisite piano performance of Jorge Bolet on the soundtrack, the rich cinematography of James Wong Howe, and the flavorful performances by a talented cast headed by Dirk Bogarde.