Before the Marx Brothers’ Freedonia, there was the equally daft
Ruritania, a mythical substitute for all things Balkan, semi-feudal states
still run by kings and queens, nestling somewhere in the vanishing borders of
the Austro-Hungarian Empire but still locked in time, a home for heroes and
their distressed damsels. In Italy this land was Silistria or Silistrie, described
by one critic as “the promised land of cinematic heroes… It is a kind of
barracks in which resides a king, a crown prince, great generals, captains,
officers, a few soldiers, many spies and a few diplomats… “
That quote of from Festival Director Jay Weissberg’s notes on
this film and, given that Ruritania is one of this year’s themes, it’s fitting
that we kicked off the virtual Giornate with what was one of the earliest and
most influential of Italian Silistrie films, Ubaldo Maria Del Colle’s Sui
gradini del trono (1912); all the finery, gallantry and nobility you could
possibly wish for, accompanied by suitably grand gestures on the piano from Günter
A. Buchwald.
As with much Italian cinema of this year, the action is
mostly fixed camera shots of tableau with some gorgeous, layered mise en scene
and lavish exterior shots that Del Colle intermingles with reaction shots –
players inside looking out as a parade assembles. As always, it’s so
interesting to see the film makers working within the constraints of their
craft and pushing the limits. There are so many shots in this film, it’s a rich
visual treat with characters moving across the spaces drawing the eye and
creating a dynamism potentially lacking in studio-based productions.
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| Dynamic tableaux |
Any resemblance to The Prisoner of Zenda is purely coincidental
but the plot did make me worry that, given current circumstances, somebody
might bump into a criminal who looks exactly like Charles Windsor and install
the doppelgänger on the British throne in order to fulfil a dastardly power
grab… stranger things are clearly happening anyway.
110 years ago, though, all seems much more normal, with the
young Prince Wladimir (Alberto A. Capozzi) all set to be King once he comes of
age, even though he’s a very mature-looking teen. Until then he has to
do as he’s told by the wicked Regent Backine (Giovanni Enrico Vidali). Backine
has his eyes on marrying his daughter to the Prince but our hero only loves
Princess Olga (Maria Gandini) and even the promise of undying loyalty from his
sneaky mentor isn’t enough to convince him.
You accompany the Prince to Paris and try and make him
forget all about his kingdom and more particularly Princess Olga…
Backine works up a plan and sends Wladimir to Paris
accompanied by his henchman, Sobieski (the wonderfully featured Giovanni Ciusa,
who’d give Daisy Doodad a run for her money in the gurning stakes…). The plan
is to distract the Prince and he needs little help, soon falling for a dancer
called Camilla, sorry, Thaïs, who gives a very impressive performance in
a hall of mirrors at a nightclub, a superb invention from Del Colle and one of
the most satisfying scenes in the film.
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| Thaïs dances with the mirrors |
Worse is to come for our royal rotter though – poor Olga! –
as Sobieski spots a young man, Chichito, who is the absolute spitting image of Wladimir
give or take a criminal swagger and some low-rent facial hair. Backine is
summoned to France and soon gets Chichito involved in a plot to replace the
Prince. Chichito shows Thaïs his double’s love letters to Olga and, her heart
broken, she agrees to entrap Wladimir by luring him to a country mansion he
just happens to have spare, and a trap door to a basement prison.
Wladimir securely out of the way, can anything stop the
rotten Regent replacing the rightful ruler?!
The story was written by Renzo Chiosso, who, as Jay Weissberg
notes, specialized in Silistrian stories contributing to some of the 65 or more
films made in Italy set in mythical Balkan kingdoms. The fascination with this
area may have been sparked by the marriage of the Montenegrin princess Queen
Elena, to the Italian crown prince, Vittorio Emanuele, in 1896, who became
queen of Italy from 1900 to 1946. In Britain, there was a similar fascination
with Royal cousins and when Queen Elisabeth of Romania stayed in the Welsh resort
of Llandudno for five weeks in 1890, the town renamed streets in her honour, there’s
a Roumania Drive, a Princess Drive as well as a Carmen Sylva Road, a nod to her
pen name used in novels and poems.
At the same time these figures were being romanticized they
were also under political threat; change was coming and perhaps that added to
the mythical appeal. There’s further visits to Silistria/Ruritania in Pordenone
and we shall find out more, much more...
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| Characterful baddies... |
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| Interior view of exterior scene |
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| Rich design |
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| Plotting |
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| And this is the real me. |
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