De Mayerling a Sarajevo

Mayerling:crown prince Rudolph committed suicide and,as emperor Francis Joseph had only one son,it's Francis Ferdinand,his nephew ,who inherited the empire,a melting pot,people who were longing to free from the Hapsburg's yoke.

The movie mainly focuses on Francis Ferdinand's love story with Czech countess Sophie Chotek.Misalliance,hence morganatic marriage.John Lodge's character is bold,human ,very chivalrous and likable.The historians are more reserved as far as reality is concerned.Nevertheless,his "United States of Europa " plan was ahead of its time,and might have preserved the Hapsburgs from their impending downfall.

Edwige Feuillere is credible as Sophie Chotek,although,here again,the character might be too good to be true.The movie features Marie -Therese De Bragance (Gabrielle Dorziat),Francis -Ferdinand's stepmother, who died in 1944.

The movie cleverly insists on the lack of precautionary measures in Sarajevo.Some went as far as to claim that the thoughtlessness in Vienna led to the tragedy.

The movie was released at the beginning of 1940 ,before the Occupation and can be seen as some kind of propaganda vehicle,as was Marcel Lherbier's "entente cordiale".It ends with pictures from WW1 and Nazism. Max Ophuls was to do much better after the war,with such works as "le plaisir" "Madame de.." and "Lola Montès".

While highly romanticized, Ophul's treatment of the subject is not mistaken. He does make Archduke Franz Ferdinand more attractive than in life, in which he was usually gruff rather than charming. Yet his hopes for the Austro-Hungarian Empire were promising, as they appear in the film, and he did enjoy the support and friendship of German Kaiser Wilhelm II. While Emperor Franz Josef had a certain presence, and in his old age and after the tragedies of Mayerling and the assassination in 1898 of his erratic but lovely wife, Empress Elisabeth, became endeared to his subjects, he was none the less trapped in court etiquette. He had no ideas about improving and making his empire more viable, but simply persisted in old ways and habits. The film makes him somewhat more sympathetic to Franz Ferdinand than he likely was. Franz Ferdinand adored the Countess Chotek and his family, and was understandably distressed at his treatment by the Emperor and Court. Sadly the last scene seems hasty and the car not the same as seen in the photos from Sarajevo in 1914.

On 28 June 1914... In 1273, Count Radbot's seventh generation descendant Rudolph of Habsburg became Roman-German King. On 11 November 1918, the last Habsburg ruler, Charles I of Austria issued a proclamation recognizing Austria's right to determine the future of the state and renouncing any role in state affairs.

In theory, this should be an ideal subject for Max Ophuls. The star-crossed liaison between Archduke Franz Ferdinand - unwilling heir to the Habsburg throne - and his morganatic wife, Countess Sophie Chotek. Starting with their thwarted early romance, the script covers their quasi-legal yet implausibly happy marriage, and ends with the couple's assassination by a Serb terrorist in 1914. (The event that triggered World War I, as any high school student will tell you.) Heady stuff, but so starched and sterile in its handling, it recalls the historical pageants that Herbert Wilcox made for his wife Anna Neagle.

Of course, there are one or two fine sequences, where Ophuls' flowing and sinuous camerawork comes into its own. A few moments of bravura acting by the ever-magnificent Edwige Feuillere. (Notably, a scene where she turns down a court invitation to become the Archduke's mistress.) Weighing against that are a lumpish script, an absurdly propagandistic ending, a non-performance of such unerring dullness and rectitude by John Lodge that he already seems to have embarked on his later career in politics.

Sadly, I spent most of this film's running time simply waiting for it to begin. I only gave up once I realised it was almost over.

David Melville