Romy Schneider Movies

Just when life was deep into a well-hewn rut for Nino Conti (Marcello Mastroianni) and the socialite he married, he runs into an old, impoverished charwoman (Romy Schneider) on a bus. She later gets in touch with him by telephone and lets him know that she is the very same Anna he had loved two decades earlier. Ghosts of the past start to haunt Nino in more ways than one, as he remembers the times he shared with Anna. In flashbacks to those years, the film wends its way to the final conjuncture of past and present phantoms -- poking fun at upper-class society along the way. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Director Bertrand Tavernier provides an unexpected feminist slant to the otherwise standard sci-fi trappings of Death Watch. Harvey Keitel plays a man of the future who has had a camera implanted in his brain. The mechanism, which is endowed with special X-ray properties, is activated by the user's eyes. Keitel is assigned by ruthless TV producer Harry Dean Stanton to secretly probe the subconscious of a dying woman, played by Romy Schneider. Stanton is only interested in the grim spectacle of what goes on inside the brain of someone who knows she's doomed. Keitel, on the other hand, becomes increasingly compassionate--and disgusted by the tawdriness of his assignment--as he stares into Schneider's tortured psyche. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Bloodline, a thriller based on a mystery novel by Sidney Sheldon and directed by Terence Young, is the story of Elizabeth Roffe (Audrey Hepburn), who inherits a huge pharmaceutical company and then discovers that some of her family members may be plotting her death in order to gain control of the company. Despite an all-star cast including the usually excellent James Mason, Irene Papas, Ben Gazzara, the lovely Romy Schneider and Omar Sharif and wonderful locations, this thriller just doesn't generate much suspense despite numerous likely suspects and plot twists. Director Young gets only an average performance from Audrey Hepburn and manages to do little with his distinguished cast. The film while not particularly suspenseful is aided by the lovely color photography of Freddie Young and a lively, original score by Ennio Morricone. ~ Linda Rasmussen, Rovi

Nominated for an Academy Award, Claude Sautet's A Simple Story (Une Histoire Simple) examines the behavior of its characters as dictated by their environment. Romy Schneider plays Marie, a fortysomething working woman whose tiresome existence has prompted her to inaugurate an affair. Marie eventually parts with her lover, aborting the pregnancy resulting from her liaison. She pauses long enough to take stock of her current situation, and to muse on its possible outcome. Though exuding star quality throughout, Romy Schneider is thoroughly believable as the essentially ordinary, nonspectacular heroine. Her behavior is not that of a wealthy play-actress but a genuine bourgeois woman emotionally hemmed in by her social strata. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Social classes and different cultures collide as three disparate men try to court a wealthy young woman (Romy Schneider) in this French drama. One of them, an impoverished aristocrat marries her for her money. Though he is terribly cynical, he does, in some strange way, love her. She is also loved by a super-straight-arrow industrialist. The third lover is a fugitive Greek communist who has been trying to escape Johannes Metaxas' secret police. He and the protagonist are having an affair. Soon after the woman bears him a daughter, the communist is killed. WW II erupts and the woman vanishes. Years pass and the daughter grows up. She heads for Greece to learn more about her parents. There the woman's husband and the capitalist meet again and discuss their shared past. The cinematography of this sweeping romance, based on a novel by Pierre Drieu La Rochelle, is particularly beautiful. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

In this crime drama, a philandering wife plans to ill her alcoholic husband so she can run away with her lover. It all goes according to plan, and the widow is finally happy. Her happiness is short lived, as the "dead" husband shows up alive on her doorstep. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Old Gun (Le Vieux Fusil) stars Philippe Noiret as an aging, embittered French physician. During the occupation, Noiret loses his wife and daughter to Nazi bullets. He vows to personally kill every one of the Germans responsible (along with a few who weren't) in order to assuage his grief. Romy Schneider and Jean Bousse costar in this heart rending character study. Philippe Noiret was justifiably honored with the French Cesar Award for his towering performance in Old Gun. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Elizabeth (Romy Schneider) and her daughter (Benedicte Bucher) take a holiday together, and each of them has a brief romance: the mother has an affair with a suitably mysterious Italian (Nino Castelnuovo) and the girl has a satisfying flirtation with a boy her own age (Alain David). ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Luchino Visconti (Count don Luchino Visconti di Modrone) was a film director, true, but he was also a nobleman and a grand patron of traditional European culture: opera, art, music, crafts and literature. These interests enliven many of his films, but few have been so inspired as the four-hour epic, Ludwig, about the castle-building "mad king" of Bavaria. This long film, made very near the end of Visconti's life, suffers greatly when shortened, as every moment is essential to the story. There are at least four different versions of the film (from just under three hours to over four hours in length); the uncut four-hour version is the most coherent, even though many might find it rather long. The disintegration of aristocratic individuals is a continuing theme of Visconti's, though Ludwig's is the most thorough decay he filmed. The last ruling king of Bavaria (1845-1886) is noted for many things besides his eccentricities: he sold Bavaria to Germany, ending the rule of the Bavarian monarchy; he built amazing castles all over his country (with the proceeds from the sale); and he was Richard Wagner's main sponsor. He was also a notorious recluse, conducting a lifelong platonic love affair with Empress Elizabeth of Austria, and finally succumbing to his adoration of handsome men in a series of outrageous affairs and orgies. His excesses eventually led to his being declared mentally incompetent and being held prisoner in his own castle. The film depicts this incredible life from his coronation at age 19 to his (unproved) assassination well over 20 years later. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Claude Sautet's romantic drama César et Rosalie (Cesar and Rosalie) stars Romy Schneider as Rosalie, a beautiful young woman involved with successful businessman Cesar (Yves Montand). One day, Rosalie's former flame David (Sami Frey) appears and attempts to win her back. Cesar reacts with a jealous intensity never before seen by Rosalie, and because of that, she returns to David. She remains conflicted regarding her choice of partner, but eventually, one of the men does something which resolves the situation. César et Rosalie contains one of the first screen appearances of French actress Isabelle Huppert. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

A soccer player, a child and an artist find their lives entangled in a story which achieves it climax in a pivotal soccer match. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

After laboring in obscurity for several years, French filmmaker Claude Sautet finally struck a responsive chord with moviegoers in Les Choses de la Vie. The plot isn't much: the hero, businessman Michel Piccoli, must choose between his wife and his mistress, two women whom he loves with equal fervor. It is what Sautet does with the material that lifts the film above the ordinary. The director puts the central character's plight in context with his ongoing concerns over his job, his income, and his relationship with his family. In Choses de la Vie Sautet has nothing but the warmest feelings for his characters, which results in more three-dimensionality that might normally be expected in so banal a plotline. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi