I legionari

This film is rarely seen, as it is blamed for the subsequent bankruptcy of the UFA film distribution company. And Hildegard KNEF's star career also suffered a decisive blow. Yes, it's true: This film by Wolfgang STAUDTE isn't particularly well done. But one after anonther!

In Algiers at the end of the 1950s, a determined teacher (Hildegard KNEF / GERMAN FILM AWARD for DER MANN, DER SICH VERKAUFTE / THE MAN WHO SOLD HIMSELF) from France tries to help her numerous students. One day she is taken hostage by three deserting Foreign Legionnaires (Bernhard WICKI (OSCAR nomination for DIE BRÜCKE) as an Italian, Helmut SCHMID as an Irishman and Joachim HANSEN as a wounded German). After some back and forth, their German commander (Hannes MESSEMER) also joins the deserters. What follows is an escape through the Sahara, during which the patriotic French woman becomes more and more doubtful about colonialism. They parted ways in Algiers. The French woman sympathizes more and more with the German ex-commander and helps where she can. Back in Belfort, France, with her handsome fiancé (Harry MEYEN), the French woman, who is experienced in the Resistance, finds herself increasingly in a crisis of meaning. There is another fateful encounter...

First of all, it should be said that Wolfgang STAUDTE (GERMAN FILM PRIZE 1975 (h.c.)) tried very hard to be authentic when filming in Tangier and Algiers and therefore did not deliver a sterile studio production. But: The rumor-like script by Johannes Mario SIMMEL meanders between a sense of adventure (very action-packed for a German film, which is commendable) and political kitsch. Why is a German film being made about the neighboring country's Algerian conflict 13 years after the Hitler era? Couldn't one deal with one's own crimes from the recent past? And why should a former Resistance fighter risk a prison sentence of several years for, of all things, a German legionnaire? Not a very credible role for a global star like KNEF! You can be happy for Hannes MESSEMER that he shoots the bird and gets the girl. Oh well...

That was probably nothing! Despite all the effort and a fantastic star cast, this film was rightly unsuccessful. It is only worth seeing as a curiosity of the West German film industry.

Hildegarde Knef has been teaching in Algeria. She is preparing to return to France when five deserters from the Foreign Legion capture her. She winds up in the Casbah, escapes, and leads the police to where she was captured. Only one of the deserters is there; he is dead. She returns to France, but she will encounter one later.

Miss Knef had given up Hollywood six years earlier, when her studio, 20th Century-Fox was losing interest in her. She went to Broadway for five years and did very well, including starring in Silk Stockings opposite Don Ameche. But Hollywood still wasn't interested in her, so she returned to Germany to make this movie.... and it flopped. It's not a terrible movie, but it wasn't very good material, filled with formulaic material and with a definite anti-French attitude.