Film Intros

The Marriage of Maria Braun

In the German Film Awards for 1979 The Marriage of Maria Braun (Die Ehe der Maria Braun) won best film, best direction, best design and best performances by an actress in a leading and in a supporting role. Enfant terrible of the new wave Rainer Werner Fassbinder reached a pinnacle of commercial and critical success with this absorbing drama that charts the struggles of a young war widow (husband presumed killed in action) to make a life for herself among the ruins of a defeated nation. Fassbinder’s long-standing protegée Hanna Schygulla achieved worldwide adulation for her bravura central performance as Maria Braun, whose head and heart are severely tried and tested over the course of ten years. Fassbinder’s recognisably stylish handling of intimate relations, here developing over time against a shifting economic background, made this his biggest hit with me too (apart from the epic TV series Berlin Alexanderplatz). I look forward to renewing my acquaintance with his indefatigable heroine and her coping mechanisms in the dire straits of the immediate post-war period.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079095/

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marriage_of_maria_braun

Miracle on 34th Street

Miracle on 34th Street (1947), directed by George Seaton, was one of the impending treats that I used to circle in childhood or even teenage years on its regular appearance in the double Christmas edition of the Radio Times. The actual viewing somehow stirred me with a frisson of anticipation for the big day more than any other offering. As the present-buying frenzy builds up in snowy New York the Macy’s department store Santa comes out with the preposterous claim that he is the real McCoy. The ensuing drama, far from a frothy confection, is a conflict of ideas, and not black versus white but complex, with protagonists “Kris Kringle”, the child Susan, her mother Doris, their neighbour Fred, the store owners and the municipal authorities, all taking up and evolving their positions in a battle of words and tactics that becomes a serious matter for the kindly deluded old man. Half a century later I’m hungry to devour this surprisingly sophisticated seasonal fare again.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0039628/

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/miracle_on_34th_street