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> Letter from an Unknown Woman [VHS] |
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![Letter from an Unknown Woman [VHS]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/71GEYS8M3HL._SL160_.gif "Letter from an Unknown Woman [VHS]")
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Staring:
Joan Fontaine,
Louis Jourdan,
Mady Christians,
Marcel Journet,
Art Smith
Director:
Max Ophüls
Average Customer Rating: 
List Price: $14.98
Our Price: $69.99
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Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9780782008470
Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, NTSC
ISBN: 078200847X
Label: Republic Pictures
Manufacturer: Republic Pictures
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Republic Pictures
Release Date: 1998-01-01
Running Time: 86
Studio: Republic Pictures
Theatrical Release Date: 1948 |
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Amazon.com essential video
"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
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"Lifelong obsession" with this film!?, 2008-01-10
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!
Another Ophuls gem., 2009-03-11
In the hands of another director LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN becomes a mundane, weepy, romantic melodrama, with a trite and fairly unbelievable story line. In the hands of Max Ophuls, it becomes a profound statement of lost love, lost hope, and lost opportunity. Through his distinctive mise-en-scene encompassing fluid camera work, moody cinematography, essential setpieces and thematic devices, Ophuls turns this tearjerker into a piece of cinematic poetry. What is particularly effective to me, is Ophul's almost musical way of using recurring motifs at critical junctures to either echo or contrast the emotional states of his main characters at different points in time. It not only adds emotional depth to the narrative, but balance and aesthetic beauty to the whole structure. Train departures are prevalent motifs in his films, and in LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN, we have first Stefan (Louis Jourdan), and later Stefan Jr. leaving on a train and promising to see Lisa (Joan Fontaine) again in 2 weeks. Neither promise would be fulfilled but for tragically different reasons. Sumptuous interiors, staircases, and doors are ubiquitous elements in Ophul's work. Characters move through them like intricate clockwork to reach their fated destinies. When the young Lisa first enters Stefan's apartment it changes her life, and much later, near the end of the film, she enters the same apartment and her life is dramatically altered again. I am a huge admirer of Ophul's work, and LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN is in my opinion, his finest American film, perhaps only surpassed by his masterpiece,THE EARRINGS OF MADAME de.
One of the old classic's, 2010-01-30
It is one my sister and I watched more than a few times.Great impact,Wonderful acting from Louis Jordan and Joan Fontaine.Setting was also great.5 Stars all the way....
Moving, Sentimental but Beautifully Written Film, 2009-02-21
I first saw this film twenty years ago, and though I had reservations (it's never clear why Fontaine never gave up her infatuation and found someone else to love, and the film skips over the lean years in which she had to support her child), there are many memorable scenes to make up for it. Anyone who's ever had an unrequited love will understand this film! For me, the first part is the best, with Fontaine doing a fantastic job portraying an impressionable young girl, and later, a mature woman. How many actresses can convincingly portray a teenager and then a mother? She does this with barely any change in makeup, but in the way she holds her body and hands. It's wonderful. Her awkwardness and shyness is touching, and my favorite scene is when she's in the swing, looking up at Stefan's window. As Stefan, Louis Jourdan does a creditable job, but the movie belongs to Fontaine. Memorable - the juxtapositon of music and imagery are perfect.
ALL TIME GREAT, 2009-06-17
I FIRST SAW THIS MOVIE 51 YEARS AGO WHEN I WAS 12 OR 13 YEARS OLD. I FELL IN LOVE WITH THIS MOVIE AS WELL AS PORTRAIT OF JENNIE. I KNOW BY TODAY'S STANDARDS ITS A SILLY MOVIE BUT I STILL LOVE THIS MOVIE. I WATCH IT NOW AT LEAST ONCE A YEAR.
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