Quand les fantômes s'amusent

After the musical prologue and the opening credits, all of which are sung, I was certain that German supernatural musical comedy The Haunted Castle was going to be insufferable; however, the film's frivolous nature, general quirkiness and jaunty tunes eventually worked their magic on me and I found myself having a good time, even though I wasn't quite sure what they were singing about a lot of the time and much of the humour left me perplexed (the subtitles might be to blame for my lack of understanding).

The lovely Liselotte Pulver (another reason I enjoyed the film) plays Comtesse Charlotte von Sandau, who is in financial dire straits and about to lose her ancestral castle to greedy developers, who want to turn her home into a hotel. Help comes in the unlikely incorporeal form of several ghosts - thieves who were executed for their crimes and who now seek to atone for their misdeeds. Things get really crazy when the Comtesse plays host to a foreign prince (Hans Clarin), but is arrested when her royal guest's jewels go missing.

The supernatural silliness sees the ghosts helping Charlotte with chores around the castle (these scenes employing plenty of fun old-school special effects), cooking up a recipe to become corporeal again, and in the amusing final act, trying to convince the Comtesse's love interest, Martin Hartog (Heinz Baumann), that they exist, to no avail (he's too drunk to appreciate their spooky shenanigans). For me, though, the film's most memorable moment comes when Hartog assumes the role of the castle's tour guide and proceeds to lead the visitors through the rooms at speed, everyone wearing roller skates hidden by oversized shoes (having said that, the 'race to the moon' final scene is also extremely wacky!).

6/10.

Just two years after the phenomenal success of THE WIRTSHAUS IM SPESSART, the West German film director Kurt HOFFMANN, who had won two GOLDEN GLOBES with FELIX KRULL and WIR WUNDERKINDER, followed up with this "Grusical".

This time the story takes place in the immediate present. The robbers of yesteryear are only active as ghosts. During the construction of a motorway service station called Spessart, which is supposed to stand exactly where the inn from the first part once was, the ghosts end up in a nearby castle that has already seen its best days behind it. The young Comtesse Charlotte (GOLDEN GLOBE nominee Liselotte PULVER, nominated for A GLOBAL AFFAIR in 1964) is struggling with the high costs and doesn't really know what to do anymore. Then the ghosts come just in time!

At the same time, a hotel heir (Heinz BAUMANN) and a senior government councilor (Hubert von MEYERINCK) are involved. The latter provides the Comtesse with a state guest from the young Federal Republic as an overnight guest. But this extravagant Prince Kalaka (Hans CLARIN) really makes the castle shake...

Successful continuation of the Spessart spectacle! Enchanting musical interludes by Friedrich HOLLAENDER, really funny ghosts (Hanne WIEDER, Paul ESSER, Hans RICHTER, Curt BOIS and Georg THOMALLA) and surprisingly sharp-tongued quips against the political charades of the still young Federal Republic make the film a very special pleasure.

Filming took place in Mittenberg, Aschaffenburg and Bonn. Oelber Castle in Lower Saxony functioned as a haunted castle. The studio recordings took place at BAVARIA FILM near Munich. More than 9 million visitors were attracted to West German cinemas, with an estimated box office of the equivalent of 6.8 million euros. One of the great successes of the West German film industry!

basically a sequel to "Das Wirtshaus I'm Spessart" based on the popular German fairy tale/legend, which came to the big screen 2 years earlier, this movie stars nearly all of Germany's comedians of that time. At first a mixture of comedy and musical, it is also pretty political and aims mostly for post-war short-comings after the German "Wirtschaftswunder", like pensions still paid to former "Wehrmacht"-Officers, but makes fun also of celebrities of that time like the liaison of Onassis and Maria Callas, just to name one.

The story is about the ghosts of the robbers from "Wirtshaus I'm Spessart" and how they redeem themselves. As a punishment for their crimes they were locked up in the basement of the "Wirtshaus" (pub) to starve to death, accompanied by a curse that they should rot there as long the walls would be standing.

The wall falls when the old pub has to make room for a gas-station and a new motel next to the brand new freeway and the souls of the robbers are freed. Now ghosts they come to the conclusion that they have to do something good, so be released. So they decide to search for the Castle of the Comte, they blackmailed in the first Movie and who resided over the Woods they were thieving in.

They find it to be inherited by the last Comtess, played by Lieselotte Pulver, who has no money at all, because her late father lost all the family fortune.

(to be continued)

This sequel takes place several hundred years after the original movie "Wirthaus im Spessart". The robbers have long been caught and sentenced to death and killed, now their ghosts have returned to the castle of the contessa who once befriended their leader. There, they find her grand-grand-grand..... daughter, and decide to help her out to pay for their sins in their lives.

Once again it is a romantic comedy, this time with a few ghost sidekicks thrown in, and lots of slapstick humour that kids like. My favourite part has to be the musical number "Woll'n wir doch mal sehn ob's nicht Gespenster gibt in Bonn" - hillarious!

However, I'm not sure how much it would appeal to adults.