Gustav Rudolf Sellner Movies
- 1975
Based on the best-selling novel by Nobel-laureate Heinrich Böll, this drama is a passionate indictment of Catholicism. Hans Schnier (Helmut Griem) has earned his living as a clown, though he is in fact a very covert sort of social critic. After enduring a difficult childhood in Bonn during the Second World War, including his mother's fanatic Nazism, he is appalled to discover many of the people he knows and loves swept deeply into involvement in the Catholic Church. His complete estrangement from his family and friends, who are now either bourgeois or passionately Catholic (or both), is demonstrated to him, after he makes a series of efforts to make contact. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Helmut Griem, Hanna Schygulla, (more)
- 1974
The Pedestrian (Der Fussganger) was the second filmed directorial effort of German actor Maximillian Schell. Billed third under Gustav Rudolf Sellner and Ruth Hausmeister, Schell plays Andreas Giese, a Krupp-like industrialist whose past suddenly returns to haunt him. A newspaper article reveals that Giese was responsible for the wartime destruction of a Greek village and the wholesale slaughter of the villagers. Whether or not Giese feels remorse for his actions is ultimately beside the point: his family is torn apart and his son kills himself as a result of the accusation. Here as in other films, Schell exhibits his fondness for female European film stars of days gone by: Elizabeth Bergner, Lil (Metropolis) Dagover, Francoise Rosay and Peggy Ashcroft appear in key minor roles. The winner of several international awards and a "best foreign picture" Oscar nominee, The Pedestrian was also produced and written by Schell. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1970
Brand new operas are a relatively infrequent phenomenon, and films of new operas are even rarer. This 1970 film enshrines a 1963 opera composed by Hans Werner Henze (born 1926) in the neoclassical manner pioneered by Igor Stravinsky. The story, set in 1830's Germany and based on a libretto by Ingeborg Bachmann, follows the progress of a cynical English nobleman's practical joke on a town full of people who seem to think that anything the nobility does is all right with them -- even when, as in this case, it involves foisting off a circus ape as a dear relative and holding a grand ball for him. The over-trained animal spouts odd maxims and quotes from Goethe, before "going ape" and wreaking havoc. With its satirical and comic elements, this opera might readily have joined the world's standard operatic repertoire, except for one crucial omission: reviewers complained that the neoclassical score lacked any trace of a memorable melody. While this might be forgiven in a short piece, in an opera, it soon becomes very difficult to take. Despite that, The Young Lord remains on the (very) short list of modern works that are performed occasionally to round out an otherwise too-conservative season. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Edith Mathis
