Johann Strauss

(On Cable TV, May 2022) Coming from classic Hollywood’s tradition of biographies as pretext for lavish costume drama, The Great Waltz is nominally about the life of Johann Strauss… which even the film itself acknowledges isn’t meant to be faithfully represented by the film. Taking a more entertaining approach, the film goes for broad and obvious tropes, mixing music, romance and professional success into something meant to be enjoyed on a basic level. A lot more effort has been poured into the sets, music, cinematography and costumes – and the money’s all there to see on the screen, with a few Academy Awards nominations (and one win for cinematography) as a result. A few dance sequences bring the film closer to a musical, or at least as close to a musical as late-1930s MGM could go. It’s amazing that director Julien Duvivier, fresh off the success of romantic drama Pepe le Moko, would go on to “direct” this film, even if a number of film historians are skeptical about his true input. Clearly a prestige production for MGM, The Great Waltz is nonetheless not much of a film once you strip away its lavish presentation – a few good scenes help it stay afloat, but it’s liable to be a film of superficial impressions, leaving very little in memory even a few days later.