Egon Schiele: Tod und Mädchen is a historical and biographical drama which premiered at the Zurich Film Festival in 2016.
The topic is the life and work of the Austrian artist Egon Schiele.
Here is some basic information about this drama:
** English title: Egon Schiele: Death and the Maiden
** Director: Dieter Berner
** Writers: Dieter Berner and Hilde Berger
** Based on the book Egon Schiele: Tod und Mädchen by Hilde Berger (2009)
** Language: German
** Run time: 104 minutes
The cast includes the following:
** Noah Saavedra as Egon Schiele (born 12 June 1890) (died 31 October 1918) – an artist
** Maresi Riegner as
Gertrud (Gerti) (1894-1981) –
Egon’s sister - wife of Anton Peschka (married 1914-1940)
** Larissa Aimée Breidbach as Moa Mandu – an artist and a dancer – Egon’s model and mistress
** Valerie Pachner as Walburga (Wally) Neuzil (1894-1917) – a nurse - Egon’s model and mistress 1911-1915
** Marie Jung as Edith Harms (born 04 March 1893) (died 28 October 1918) – Egon’s wife (married 1915-1918)
** Elisabeth Umlauft as Adele Harms – sister of Edith – Egon’s sister-in-law
** Thomas Schubert as Anton Peschka (1885-1940) –
an artist – a painter – Gerti’s husband (married 1914-1940)
** Daniel Strässer as Erwin Dominik (Dom) Osen (1891-1971) - an artist
** Cornelius Obonya as Gustav Klimt (born 14 July 1862) (died 06 February 1918) – an artist – Egon’s mentor
In this drama, the life and work of the Austrian artist Egon Schiele is covered in great detail.
In this drama, we follow his life and work from 1910 until his death in 1918, with special focus on the five women who play a significant role in his short life:
** Gerti Schiele - his sister
** Moa Mandu - an artist and a dancer – his model and mistress
** Wally Neuzil – a nurse - his model and mistress
** Edith Harms – his wife
** Adele Harms – his sister-in-law
Egon Schiele is a famous artist. He is also a highly controversial artist.
Gustav Klimt is his mentor. His early works are clearly inspired by Klimt.
Later, he develops his own style. It is new and different. Some people love it; others hate it. He is adored and loved by some; hated by others.
He is a soldier in World War One. He survives the war. But he does not survive the Spanish Flu, which kills millions of soldiers and civilians all over the world.
Egon Schiele and his wife Edith Harms are among the numerous victims of this pandemic, which is active for two years (1918-1920).
What about the title of the drama?
Tod und Mädchen
In English:
Death and the Maiden
What does it mean?
The title of the drama (and the title of the book on which the drama is based) is borrowed from a painting which shows two persons: a man and a girl. The girl is Wally.
Egon makes this painting in 1915, two years before Wally dies. The original title is Man and Maiden.
In 1917, when Egon receives a message telling him that Wally has died – she was killed by scarlet fever - he changes the first word. Now the title is:
Death and the Maiden
What do reviewers say about this drama?
Here are some results:
On IMDb it has a rating of 65 percent.
On Amazon there are at the moment more than 180 ratings of this product, more than 30 with reviews.
The average rating is 4.4 stars which corresponds to a rating of 88 percent.
In my opinion, the first rating is too low, while the second rating is too high.
I like this drama and I want to give it a good rating, but I cannot go all the way to the top, because there is a flaw.
What is wrong?
There are many characters in this drama, but it is not easy to figure out who is who and how they are connected with each other.
When the characters meet each other, they do not always address each other by name, because they already know each other. But the viewer does not know them.
The viewer wants to know who is who and how they are connected with each other. It takes a while to find out who is who.
Sometimes a character appears and disappears again before the viewer has a chance to find out who this person is. This is unfortunate.
Whenever a new chapter begins; whenever the story moves to a new location, an on-screen message tells us where we are in time and place. This is very helpful.
This method can also be used to identify the characters. An on-screen message can appear whenever a character appears on the screen for the first time.
This message can identify the person with a name and perhaps with an occupation. This is an easy way to solve this problem. Unfortunately, this solution was not used here. This is a flaw.
I have to remove one star because of this flaw. I think this product deserves a rating of four stars (80 percent).
REFERENCES
Egon Schiele: Love and Death
By Jane Kallir
(2005)
Egon Schiele: Masterpieces of Art
By Rosalind Ormiston
(2016)
Schiele
By Reinhard Steiner
(2017)
Egon Schiele: The Complete Paintings
By Tobias Gunter Natter
(2017)
The Flames
By Sophie Haydock
(2022)
This volume is about the four women who pose for Egon and who play a significant role in his life. They are his muses. They are his flames. The author Sophie Haydock does not count Egon's sister Gerti.
*****
Egon Schiele:
Death and the Maiden
A historical and biographical drama
which premiered in 2016
*****
Egon Schiele:
Tod und Mädchen
A historical and biographical novel
By Hilde Berger
(2009)
*****
The famous and controversial
Austrian artist
Egon Schiele
(1890-1928)
This photo shows him in 1914
when he is 24 years old
*****
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