Geständnis unter vier Augen

Moderately entertaining film about Rumanian refugees in Germany after WW2 and I think a film made to make German audiences aware of the life of refugees and life in refugee camps of which at the time there were many. Well meant but the story concentrates on a well-off refugee while the not so-well off who live in a camp, hardly are given any background. Moreover, for the viewer the intrigue is too obvious and lets the viewer wonder why Hildergard Knef's character is that naïve not to comprehend this from the start. Carl Raddatz plays a police inspector who walks on and off without ever being a really integral part of the story, though with his well-known forbearance he does it well. The film is not helped much by so-so direction and pacing.

German post-war drama with Hildegard Knef

Directed by Andre Michel, this film was made in 1954 based on the novel "Geständnisse unter vier Augen / Confessions in Private" by Hugo Maria Kritz. The camera was directed by Helmuth Ashley, who two/three decades later would become one of the important directors of episodes of the very successful television series DERRICK.

Hildegard Knef (the super star of those years) plays a successful journalist named Hilde Garden who is confronted with dark machinations of the post-war period. As a Romanian-German (at one point in the film Romanian is even spoken, but without subtitles!) she is also personally familiar with the difficult situation of the displaced people. And then there are the pitfalls of love...

You can already guess that many conflicts are intertwined in this film. In addition to Hildegard Knef, who is, as is often the case, great, actors such as Carl Raddatz (with whom she had already filmed the cinematic gem "Unter den Brücken" (1945)), Ivan Desny (as a love interest and as a mysterious businessman, like him in a similar way in 1978) shine in "Die Ehe der Maria Braun / The Marriage of Maria Braun" by Rainer Werner Fassbinder), Werner Hinz and especially Hans Christian Blech in a small but fine supporting role.

A surprising number of critical aspects of the post-war period are convincingly integrated into the plot. Hildegard Knef (1925-2002) plays a modern working woman who, despite her ability, does not really perceive the things that are in front of her. Her Hilde Garden thus represents the many Germans who, in the past and in the present, could not or did not want to see the obvious.

This film, which is well worth seeing, was shot in the Göttingen studio of Filmaufbau GmbH and on location shots in Hamburg and Nürnberg / Nuremberg. In Spain it was shown under the title "Confesion ante cuatro ojos", in Italy as "La collana dellasfinge nera".

Highly recommended not only for fans of the great Hildegard Knef!