Capital Celluloid 2024 — Day 148: Wed May 29

Lola Montes (Ophuls, 1955): Cine Lumiere, 6.10pm


This film, a masterpiece by any standards, is also screening at Cine Lumiere on May 26th when it will be introduced by Academy Awards-nominated composer Gary Yershon. Details here.

Chicago Reader review:
A baroque masterpiece by Max Ophuls, his last film (1955) and his only work in color and wide-screen. The producers were expecting a routine melodrama with Martine Carol (a bland French star of the period); when they saw what Ophuls had made—with its exquisite stylization, elaborate flashbacks, and infinite subtlety—they cut it to ribbons. The film was restored in the 60s and impressed some critics, including Andrew Sarris, as "the greatest film ever made," and certainly this story of a courtesan's life is among the most emotionally plangent, visually ravishing works the cinema has to offer. With Peter Ustinov, Anton Walbrook, Ivan Desny, and Oskar Werner.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

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