Winner of the Jury Grand Prize at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival, of the National [US[ Board of Review award for best foreign language film, Eric Rohmer's adaptation of Heinrich von Kleist's 1805 novella Die Marquise von O... was obviously made for little money, mostly shot in one house.

Like the novella, the film begins with the  notice in the newspaper of the marquise (Edith Clever), who has been a widow for three years, seeking to learn the identity of the man who impregnated her and pledging to marry whomever that was. Then it is back to the battle over an Italian castle defended against Russian (!?) invaders by the marquise's father (Peter Lühr). A Russian count/lt. col. (Bruno Ganz) saves the marquise from being raped by Russian troops and conducts her to safety.

A month or so later, the count returns (en route to Naples) with an urgent suit. The marquise decided after the grief of her husband's death never to remarry. The count is very persistent, but has to bow (literally and figuratively) before the father (now governor rather than commander of the fort/castle) speaking for his daughter demanding time to consider marriage to her savior.

A bit later, she is shocked to find that she is pregnant. Her father and  mother (Edda Seippel) think she is hiding the identity of the man with whom she conceived a child and drive her out of the house, not for having strayed from the path of virtue but for refusing to name the father. Edith Clever is extraordinary in showing the confusion and shame and anguish of someone in this untenable position.

Eventually, everything is revealed. Knowing the source material, I was never in doubt about the paternity that was unknown to the mother, and I think that it is obvious to a viewer of the film before it is to the marquise —and my partner who has never read the novella solved the mystery before its revelation.

Both Clever and Ganz won 1976 German film awards for best actress and actor. I was impressed by Clever's portrayal of purity besmirched. I was less impressed by Ganz, looking like the young Napoleon (in hairstyle and height), though his part was very stylized (and much briefer than Clever's). The parents' severity and shame were very well conveyed, and their servant Leopardo (Bernhard Frey) was very decorative. The great Cuban-born cinematograher Néstor Almendros did typically fine work with a palette less rich than in his Oscar-winning "Days of Heaven."         

The opening battle, even the peripheral rape and pillage part that begins the story, seemed to me inept, not just low budget. Having been underwhelmed by many of Eric Rohmer's films about the contemporary French haute bourgeoisie, I was not surprised to click into the usual "The book's better" judgment. Eventually, the puzzlement and grace of the marquise justified the movie for me. The film is much more straight ahead than the twisting Kleist style, but that is no surprise.

It may be a stretch for some viewers to the mindset of very rigid codes of conduct of two centuries ago as well as to get through the wan (stylized) opening battle (and the puzzlement of czarist troops in northern Italy with both the invaders and the locals speaking German in a film by a very French director. (The movie was coproduced by Barbet Schroeder. And before returning to making films about the French upper class, Rohmer (and Almendros) went further back in time to "Perceval.")

The DVD has no bonus features.

©2009, Stephen O. Murray

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Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age