Spring Symphony (1983)

"Frühlingssinfonie" or "Spring Symphony" is a West German German-language film from 1983. It was written and directed by Peter Schamoni and is among the filmmaker's most known works. The cast includes a couple big names too, such as Nastassja Kinski, Herbert Grönemeyer and Rolf Hoppe. This 105-minute movie is one of the defining films of Kinski's (daughter's) career as she won her only German Film award for her portrayal of Clara Wieck here, the partner of famous composer Robert Schumann (played by Grönemeyer). The good thing I can say about Kinski's performance here is that it is possibly the best thing about the film and she is certainly much much better than the limited Grönemeyer. But as the film is nothing special, neither is Kinski's performance and this film award honor may have been a bit too much. I also cannot say that this movie got me curious about Schumann or Wieck and what their lives were like. It felt like a very bleak, sterile film and all the parts when Schamoni tried to make an emotional impact, I must say didn't do a lot for me. So like I already wrote in the title of my review, I felt that this became a pretty forgettable watch. Maybe you need to be a big lover of either classical music, or of Schumann in particular to enjoy the watch here, but I just could not take it seriously in the face of Grönemeyer extremely weak portrayal and choosing the path of music may have been the best thing he could have done. I do not recommend the watch. Thumbs down.

Warning: minor spoiler of sorts"Spring Symphony" is the story of Robert Schumann and Clara Wieck. Both were music entities. Robert Schumann turns out to have been a second tier composer, if that, never rising to the heights of a Beethoven or Mozart. In contrast, Clara Wieck was a master technician in the playing of the piano, a composer (probably not at Schumann's level), and was a child prodigy. Clara is a young girl of eight or nine(?) when she first encounters Schumann who is a good ten years plus older than her. Clara's father is her own personal piano teacher who also undertakes the task of training a promising Schumann in the ways of the piano. Very early on, Schumann develops problems with one of his hands that will restrict his ability to ever rise to the level of a successful piano concert player. Fortunately, Schumann has the makings of a composer of sorts. Clara is enchanted by the older Schumann's compositions and makes it a point to play them while on tour with her father as constant companion and chaperon. As Clara grows she eventually morphs into Nastassja Kinski and the stage is set for a struggle between her father and Schumann for her love, loyalty, and attention. Schumann wants to marry her while her father considers him to be a third rate musician who wants to capitalize on Clara's piano skills to support him. Of course, her father is making a nice living with Clara's performances throughout Europe. Clara is underage and needs her father's permission to marry Schumann. This culminates in an actual lawsuit to free her from her father. The movie ends with their marriage and Schumann's first symphony, "Spring Symphony." The movie is historically accurate as far as it goes."Spring Symphony" was a movie for Nastassja Kinski that was in between "Cat People" and "Exposed" - at least in terms of its release date. With Nastassja in long hair, it is possible that "Spring Symphony" was filmed either before or after "Cat People." The real life Clara Wieck was an attractive woman so that Nastassja in her role was not out of line. The "Spring Symphony" DVD is in German with English subtitles. The film is well paced and never seems to drag. Nastassja appears to be more than competent at the keyboard and must have spent many hours practicing. Perhaps this film is her tribute to Ingrid Bergman in "Intermezzo."

When I saw this dvd in the store, I was thrilled. Rushed home to watch it and was so surprised to find the entire movie in German with no choice of languages or subtitles. I looked the outside cover over many times and there is nothing anywhere indicating that it is in German. My two years of college German are not sufficient for me to follow the story line well.In spite of this language barrier, I thought the movie was well done and I enjoyed it very much. Hopefully, one of my friends who speaks German better than I will watch it with me and translate.

Writer director Alfred Hirschmeier's film about Clara Wieck and Robert Schumann offers a parallel between Schumann and Wieck's father, who are both seen to profit from their association with Clara, the child prodigy, and when the climactic trial takes place with Clara and Schumann suing Wieck senior for consent for them to be married, one's sympathies are divided. It isn't just that Schumann, who looks a good 10 years older than Clara Wieck, is the more unlikeable since he is always blaming his inability to compose on his poor financial position, and his love of Clara doesn't stop him from regular infidelities. There's also the queasy incestuous behaviour between the Wiecks, actor Herbert Gronemeyer who plays Schumann's facial resemblance to Nastassja Kinski's (she plays Clara) real life father Klaus, and Schumann being a student of Mr Wieck so adopting a father/son relationship. History tells us of the outcome, but we also get the suggestion that Clara's marriage also means the subjugation of her identity to her husband's. We are told that she became the greatest exponent of Schumann's music, but this sounds like a compromise for someone who could have been the greatest pianist of all time. Hirschmeier's screenplay is full of corny melodrama such as "How will this all end?", "Just think how many great musicians have come before you", "If you want my life, it is yours for the asking", "I want to melt in your music", "I was struck by a moonbeam", and the inevitable classical music comparison spoken by Schumann - "Bach has the heaviness, Mozart the lightness, Beethoven the warmth, and Schubert the darkness. What do you have? The nothingness. I have the infinity of nothingness which is greater than all things together". There is also the odd use of "house arrest" described for what we know refer to as a child being grounded. Hirschmeier provides a montage of posters for Clara's concerts, a cut from news of Schumann's inability to marry another female to Clara's performance triumph, a scene where the blind touch Kinski's hands, and a sound edit from orchestral musicians tapping to horses hooves of a moving carriage. Although this biopic may spare us the Hollywood-ised cliches of composer biopics, where the music is an extension of the artist's life, the treatment here is perhaps too reverential. As Wieck senior, Rolf Hoppe makes someone that could have been played as a villian some nice touches, with Hoppe and Kinski being a more dynamic team than Kinski and Gronemeyer. There is one scene where Kinski sits in Hoppe's lap and we watch the perverse testing of where she will allow his hands to go, in spite of his own humiliation. Kinski captures the transformation of Clara from gawky teenager to emerging beauty, and whilst there is one shot where we see her hands and body playing the piano, otherwise there is no pretence made that she is performing Clara's pieces.