Yes, I know that most of the others who have reviewed this movie on here loved it, but I found The Great Waltz to be particularly aggravating.
Granted, there is some remarkable camera work here.
Other than that, however, this movie struck me as very weak.
Louise Rainer, whose success I have never understood, once again plays a character who seems to have a sign reading "Kick me" on her back. All she does is whimper. When she finally decides to acquire some backbone and fight to hold on to her husband, the scene reminded me of the similar moment near the end of "The Women." Rainer's performance only paled further in comparison to Norma Shearer's, however.
Meliza Korjus, the other female lead, was better, and had a stronger, more interesting character. Still, it sometimes ended up being a battle between the accents. Rainer's was a general European mishmash; Korjus sometimes sounded perilously close to Fanny Brice. Both could have used a few weeks with a diction coach, which MGM had on hand in those days.
And then there were the god-awful orchestrations. Imagine if Milos Forman had asked John Williams to "arrange" Mozart's music for Amadeus. Music lovers would have been outraged, and rightly so. Yet this movie had the equivalent. Strauss was a very fine orchestrator of his own music. Instead, however, this movie presented it in wildly overdone "arrangements" by someone else (Dimitri Tiomkin). Korjus had a high coloratura voice, but the movie sometimes has her tossing off high staccati in people's faces in a way that is most freakish and not at all musical. Strauss' music is great, but it isn't served well in this movie.
No, the plot bears little resemblance to the facts of Strauss' life. That doesn't bother me, as it was made clear in the opening credits. But the story that was provided was not, at least to me, of any interest. Strauss, though married, falls in love with a singer. She finally leaves him, when he is ready to abandon his wife for her, for no apparent reason. At the end of the movie, 50 years later, when all of Vienna sings his music, Strauss still thinks back to that singer. Granted, given that he has spent the intervening time with the mousy and whimpering Rainer, one can't blame him, but it makes for a strange end to this generally unsatisfactory movie.
If you like Strauss's music, listen to it as he wrote it. If you want good acting or an interesting script, don't look for it here. This is pretty much a complete waste.
Granted, there is some remarkable camera work here.
Other than that, however, this movie struck me as very weak.
Louise Rainer, whose success I have never understood, once again plays a character who seems to have a sign reading "Kick me" on her back. All she does is whimper. When she finally decides to acquire some backbone and fight to hold on to her husband, the scene reminded me of the similar moment near the end of "The Women." Rainer's performance only paled further in comparison to Norma Shearer's, however.
Meliza Korjus, the other female lead, was better, and had a stronger, more interesting character. Still, it sometimes ended up being a battle between the accents. Rainer's was a general European mishmash; Korjus sometimes sounded perilously close to Fanny Brice. Both could have used a few weeks with a diction coach, which MGM had on hand in those days.
And then there were the god-awful orchestrations. Imagine if Milos Forman had asked John Williams to "arrange" Mozart's music for Amadeus. Music lovers would have been outraged, and rightly so. Yet this movie had the equivalent. Strauss was a very fine orchestrator of his own music. Instead, however, this movie presented it in wildly overdone "arrangements" by someone else (Dimitri Tiomkin). Korjus had a high coloratura voice, but the movie sometimes has her tossing off high staccati in people's faces in a way that is most freakish and not at all musical. Strauss' music is great, but it isn't served well in this movie.
No, the plot bears little resemblance to the facts of Strauss' life. That doesn't bother me, as it was made clear in the opening credits. But the story that was provided was not, at least to me, of any interest. Strauss, though married, falls in love with a singer. She finally leaves him, when he is ready to abandon his wife for her, for no apparent reason. At the end of the movie, 50 years later, when all of Vienna sings his music, Strauss still thinks back to that singer. Granted, given that he has spent the intervening time with the mousy and whimpering Rainer, one can't blame him, but it makes for a strange end to this generally unsatisfactory movie.
If you like Strauss's music, listen to it as he wrote it. If you want good acting or an interesting script, don't look for it here. This is pretty much a complete waste.