Effi Briest (1974)

In the nineteenth century, seventeen year old Effi Briest is married to the older Baron von Instetten and moves into a house, that she believes has a ghost, in a small isolated Baltic town.... See full summary »

Director:

Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Writers:

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Theodor Fontane (novel)

Stars:

Hanna Schygulla, Wolfgang Schenck, Ulli Lommel

1 win & 1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Hanna Schygulla	...	Effi Briest
Wolfgang Schenck	...	Instetten
Ulli Lommel	...	Major Crampas
Lilo Pempeit	...	Frau Briest
Herbert Steinmetz	...	Herr Briest
Ursula Strätz	...	Roswitha
Irm Hermann	...	Johanna
Karlheinz Böhm	...	Wüllersdorf (as Karl-Heinz Böhm)
Karl Scheydt	...	Kruse
Barbara Lass	...	Polnische Köchin
Rudolf Lenz	...	Geheimrat Rummschüttel
Andrea Schober	...	Annie von Instetten
Eva Mattes	...	Hulda
Theo Tecklenburg	...	Pastor Niemeyer
An Dorthe Braker	...	Frau Pasche (as Anndorthe Braker)

Storyline

In the nineteenth century, seventeen year old Effi Briest is married to the older Baron von Instetten and moves into a house, that she believes has a ghost, in a small isolated Baltic town. She soon bears a daughter, Annie, and hires the lapsed Catholic Roswitha to look after her. Effi is lonely when her husband is away on business, so she spends time riding and walking along the shore with Major Crampas. Instetten is promoted to Ministerial Councillor and the family moves to Berlin, where Effi enjoys the social life. Six years later, the Baron is given letters from Crampas to Effi that convince him that they had an affair. He feels obliged to challenge Crampas to a duel and banish Effi from the house.

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Plot Keywords:

prussian officer | dissatisfaction | duel | young wife | career | 

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Genres:

Drama | History

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

West Germany

Language:

German

Release Date:

16 June 1977 (USA)

Also Known As:

Effi Briest

Filming Locations:

Neustadt, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany

Box Office

Budget:

DEM750,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$11,623, 16 February 2003

Gross USA:

$8,144

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$8,144

Company Credits

Production Co:

Tango Film

Technical Specs

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Rainer Werner Fassbinder insisted that Kurt Raab have a bald patch shaved into his scalp for an important scene. Raab did what was asked of him only for Fassbinder to drop the scene altogether.

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Quotes

Effi Briest: He was as noble as one who doesn't know true love can be.

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Connections

Referenced in Free Rainer (2007)

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Soundtracks

Wiegenlied
Composed by Ludwig Spohr

User Reviews

Effing good!

I consider Rainer Werner Fassbinder to be the single most overrated director of all times. I have desperately tried to understand what all the fuss is about when most of his movies seem like movie Experiments gone badly wrong. Effi Briest is at least an accomplished movie with a unique style, although at 2 hours 15 minutes it's pretty slow and overly long.

Fassbinder being an eccentric artiste, couldn't just use the title of the novel but came up with a monstrous title (which the IMDb spellchecker doesn't allow me to quote here) that doesn't make much sense in German, but seems to give the movie a Marxist twist (it alludes to "many know their possibilities and requirements but chose to support the ruling system"). The title is usually mercifully shortened to just "Fontane Effi Briest".

At the time, the sound recording of films was still a considerable technical problem, so that the entire film was dubbed (the voices and partially also the background noises were re-recorded in a studio and added to the film in post-production). The dubbing was done very meticulously so that the voices are in perfect synchronicity with the lip movements. The voices are in several cases not of the actual actors, for example Eva Mathes was dubbed by another actress, and voiced yet another actress). This gives the film a touch of artificiality and a sense of heightened reality, which goes well with the slow pace of the story.

So, for a Fassbinder, it's a surprisingly watchable movie. At the same time, there is no narration, no tension, nothing is building up to anything. It's love it and sit through it, or switch off the video.

Interestingly, Fassbinder also has no intention of putting a new angle on the jaded story of the romantic girl falling victim to an uncaring world. I would love to see Effi as a competent woman trying to make her own rules, or even as a femme fatale for a change.