Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948)

"By the time you read this letter, I may be dead," reads aging bon vivant Louis Jourdan from a letter found in his tiny hotel room. With tousled hair and a tux tired from yet another night of meaningless flirtation, he's startled by these opening lines and suspends his preparations to flee a duel in order to read the history of a love affair that he can't remember. For the rest of the film we're transported to the life of Joan Fontaine's awkward young Viennese woman, who has been hopelessly enthralled by the dashing pianist ever since adolescence. For a moment she was his lover, the emotional pinnacle of her life but for the philandering rogue simply another fling in a blur of women passing through his bedroom. This was Max Ophüls's first personal project in Hollywood, and he injects this exquisitely stylish romantic melodrama (based on a novel by Stefan Zweig) with his continental sensibility. Both lush and restrained, the endlessly moving camera tracks, cranes, and circles around the characters while maintaining a measured distance. Fontaine delivers one of the best performances of her career, vulnerable and yearning without lapsing into sentimentality--and ultimately showing a hidden strength as she risks all for one more moment with the love of her life. Jourdan is genial and callow, an empty figure faced with the meaningless of his life and shamed with self-discovery. It's a sensibility more European than American, right down the empty gesture that concludes this sad melodrama. --Sean Axmaker Amazon.com essential video

"Lifelong obsession" with this film!?

Hmm. O.K. Here goes!
I first saw this film 50 years ago. Had to wait another 25 years to see it again. It was just as hypnotic as I remembered.
Now another 20 years have passed and I finally HAVE a copy!
This has been my favourite film all my life.
I hate the fact that I am becoming more "critical" of it, but that is probably normal when you have thought about a work of art many times?
So, although (almost) everyone who first sees it seems inevitably to side with LISA and condemn STEFAN...I understand so much better now what a (cruelly?) clueless position the poor guy was in....she makes a point of NEVER telling him anything!
As he ages (and goes downhill) he apparently realizes that something of great significance in Life has somehow eluded him....of course Lisa is sure (maybe rightly so?) that that treasure of Destiny is HERSELF.Here I get critical! If she "loves" him so much why does she show him no compassion? How come she...the great lover is too stupid to help him "find himself"? help him remember?....why go to him at all if she loses her nerve THROUGH SELF PITY?
I think I can say why you won't be being "critical" while you are actually watching this film....It's the clever use of the score....which is apparently crafted to guide the audience AWAY from being cynical or critical: designed to support the Lisa as 100% victim interpretation.
Because EVERY single time the critical faculty is about to comment, the MUSIC either crashes or slides or glides or murmurs "not now"....so I can be critical in detached mode...but will simply admire this masterpiece for what it is whilst under it's spell...probably tomorrow!
SPOILERS FOLLOW....
(P.S....I would rather class the "love angle" here with "the story of Adele H" or "Elvira Madigan" than with a story of True Great Love.
Why? Because the mature Lisa seems to suddenly lose her self-directed maverick "love" (as if that was merely a relic of her younger self )and faced with reality(which she is apparently too immature to overcome with REAL LOVE) it lets her down at a crucial moment...her husband who "rescued" her life was the same man who proposed years ago. It is HE who sees her enter/leave Stefan's apartment...it is HE who has challenged Stefan to a duel, although "nothing happened" and Stefan was politely bemused by her visit, It is that duel (of which she knows nothing) which will cause the death of Stefan, exhausted after a night of reading her letter!

January 10, 2008

"A Beautiful Love Story"

A lovely romantic story. I was delighted to find this movie on DVD format available now here at Amazon.A romantic movie to watch again and again. November 21, 2005

A Piece of Art...

I must say that there have been few movies (dramas) which have emotioned me so much as this work of art by master director Max Ophüls (credited as Opuls here)...only films like "Portrait of Jennie" or "Dodsworth"...this was another one-of-a-kind experience for me.

I had read so much about it, that I had to SEE it...so I bought this VHS here, at Amazon.com marketplace sellers, where I've always made great transactions & had very good overall experiences, especially when it comes to obtain, these "out of stock/print", kind of elusive gems.

Joan Fontaine gives what one can easily be, the most wondrous, poetic, performance, she ever gave, including "Rebecca" and "Suspicion"...Here she simply is at her very best, close to perfection...just as Jennifer Jones, gave (IMHO) THE performance of her career in the aforementioned "Portrait of Jennie". She convicingly grows from an "innocent" adolescent who falls deeply in love with an artist (Louis Jourdan), looking him, following him, listening to him, "in hiding", "in the shadows", quietly, living her life only "for/because of him"... although he's unaware of that. This obsession of hers with this man, reaches to a point where nothing makes sense to her without him. It's platonic love & adoration, taken to extreme limits, almost to the boundaries of insanity, yet so disarmingly naive and true!

Louis Jourdan is equally effective, as the debonair, devil-make-care, playboy, man of the world, pianist, who realizes too late, what has been going on.

Wonderful art direction, sets, mood, atmosphere, cinematography, narration...excellent "raccontos/flashbacks"...great camera work, gowns, period detail...everything is so right...especially the truth in Lisa's (Fontaine) very deep love for this man, who becomes the only reason of her life, of her "breathing", of her "existence".

Max Ophüls really made a work of art, out of this movie...which by the way, I read somewhere, had a similar plot than the 1933 "Only Yesterday", which marked the debut in the american cinema, of that gorgeous actress, Margaret Sullavan; although Ophüls' film, is by far superior...'cos it "trascends" the "Tearjerker" status; it has an ethereal quality all of his own.

Not since watching "Shadowlands" in March of this year, I had felt & been so moved by a film. Really, ROMANTIC, unrequited love, at his best. And I tell you, I'm not an "easy" person...in other words, I do not "emote" easily, and at the film's conclussion, I have no shame in admitting that I cried like a baby. It reached my heart & soul.

This film ought to be restored and released on dvd format, since it is one of the landmark films of all time. Although I must say the Republic VHS Edition, is decent indeed. August 4, 2004

An odd, brittle melodrama

Joan Fontaine stars as Lisa, an odd, possibly mentally disturbed young woman who adopts a stalkerlike, lifelong fixation on a rakish concert pianist, played by Louis Jordan, who beds her then forgets her, leaving her with child yet still obsessed with her one true love. Fontaine's cockeyed performance may project more creepiness into the role than was originally intended -- her Lisa is a genuinely disturbing character, and her clumsy attempt at an Austrian accent (the story is set in late-19th Century Vienna) gives her lines that much more of a twisted feel. It's an odd film: Jordan's character is a complete cipher, and nothing in the script redeems either one of them, really. It's hard to tell what the moral of this melodrama may be, but it will definitely elicit a visceral reaction, either of repulsion or boredom. September 9, 2003

Unforgettable... An Exceptional Film

"Letter From an Unknown Woman" is a touching, emotionally-involving movie about a
woman's life-long obsession with a handsome, charming musician who is truly not worth all of her
love and devotion. This is the kind of movie you watch when you want to lose yourself in
a whole other world--it's that engrossing. Joan Fontaine and Luis Jourdan are excellent in
their roles, and Fontaine is especially convincing as a woman hopelessly in love with
Jourdan (or the perfect man she imagines him to be). I agree with the previous reviewer
that the scene where she realizes for a second time that he doesn't recognize her is just
agonizing to watch. At 87 minutes, it doesn't drag on like many classic movies do.
Nothing is superfluous--every scene and line of dialogue is essential. I'll also mention that
besides the great acting and storyline, the direction and cinematography are also
exceptional. This is an unforgettable movie that is so overwhelming that it will literally leave you speechless. It's one of my favorite movies and I can't recommend it enough. August 12, 2003

More reviews at Amazon.com ...