I was first attracted to this lesser-known British movie by its intriguing title and then as I investigated further, interesting story-line.
It's a beautifully shot and well-played historical drama concerning the alleged romance between the dashing and handsome Swedish Count Philip Chritoph von Königsmark, (Stewart Granger) and the young wife of the Hanoverian Prince George Louis, Sophie Dorothea, (Joan Greenwood).
She has been set up by her wealthy, vainglorious father in an arranged marriage with the penniless Prince of Hanover, who lives a life of wanton hedonism, but who needs the money to finance his military ambitions. The repugnant, corpulent Prince, played with dastardly relish by Peter Bull, is also cowardly, happy to see his handsome, moral but naive brother go off to fight and die in a doomed battle while he stays at home roistering and doistering as the phrase goes. But then the young princess encounters the gallant Philip after he returns alive from the war where his friend the Prince has died.
They start am illicit affair but there are two other women in the background whose influence and actions will ultimately doom their plans to escape from the court, the Prince's icy, unfeeling mother, The Electress Sophie, played by Françoise Rosay and Philip's middle-aged mistress, the influential, conniving and jealous Countess Clara Platen, in a strong, turbulent performance by Flora Robson. The Electress has plans to get her less than regal son onto the British throne and nothing must get on the way of that, least of all a young woman's feelings of first love.
With beautiful sets and costumes, Basil Deardon skilfully moves his pieces around this historical chess-board, equally as adept at displaying the pomp and grandeur of the court as well as the darkened stairways of the empty castle to where Philip ultimately meets his doom in an especially well-lit scene, boldly filmed without any accompanying background music. Granger is well-suited to playing the tragic hero with Greenwood a good foil as his outmaneuvred young lover.
There's ample proof here that post-war British cinema was just as capable as Hollywood of producing grand, ambitious costume-dramas, making this overlooked J Arthur Rank feature well worth tracking down.
It's a beautifully shot and well-played historical drama concerning the alleged romance between the dashing and handsome Swedish Count Philip Chritoph von Königsmark, (Stewart Granger) and the young wife of the Hanoverian Prince George Louis, Sophie Dorothea, (Joan Greenwood).
She has been set up by her wealthy, vainglorious father in an arranged marriage with the penniless Prince of Hanover, who lives a life of wanton hedonism, but who needs the money to finance his military ambitions. The repugnant, corpulent Prince, played with dastardly relish by Peter Bull, is also cowardly, happy to see his handsome, moral but naive brother go off to fight and die in a doomed battle while he stays at home roistering and doistering as the phrase goes. But then the young princess encounters the gallant Philip after he returns alive from the war where his friend the Prince has died.
They start am illicit affair but there are two other women in the background whose influence and actions will ultimately doom their plans to escape from the court, the Prince's icy, unfeeling mother, The Electress Sophie, played by Françoise Rosay and Philip's middle-aged mistress, the influential, conniving and jealous Countess Clara Platen, in a strong, turbulent performance by Flora Robson. The Electress has plans to get her less than regal son onto the British throne and nothing must get on the way of that, least of all a young woman's feelings of first love.
With beautiful sets and costumes, Basil Deardon skilfully moves his pieces around this historical chess-board, equally as adept at displaying the pomp and grandeur of the court as well as the darkened stairways of the empty castle to where Philip ultimately meets his doom in an especially well-lit scene, boldly filmed without any accompanying background music. Granger is well-suited to playing the tragic hero with Greenwood a good foil as his outmaneuvred young lover.
There's ample proof here that post-war British cinema was just as capable as Hollywood of producing grand, ambitious costume-dramas, making this overlooked J Arthur Rank feature well worth tracking down.