Joan Fontaine has always in my opinion been one of those actresses who plays scared and slightly mousy characters. Here it is no different, but here it makes sense, and she plays her character with heart-felt brilliance.
Louis Jourdan couldn't be more appealing if he tried, with his sensuous voice and lovely 'classic French' look. The two characters are superb creations.
Fontaine plays Lisa, a young girl who becomes infatuated with a famous pianist named Stefan who moves to the apartment opposite her in turn of the century Vienna.
Although barely knowing that she exists, Lisa imagines that she and Stefan are meant to be together, and becomes obsessed with him, staying up all night listening to him play and sneaking into his apartment to look at his possessions.
Lisa's life is then thrust into turmoil when her mother ups and marries a man from Linz and says that they are to move there.
I don't want to spoil the film for anyone, but it really is a gorgeous tear-jerker of a movie which up until now I had only heard of vaguely.
If this is Max Ophuls at his best then I am determined to keep watching his lovely expressions of black and white cinema.
(I would dearly love to write to Jourdan and tell him how much his performance moved me, but unfortuntely I have no contact address, even for fans to send fan mail to)
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