Fascinated since adolescence by Elisabeth of Wittelsbach, known as Sissi, Empress of Austria, Vicky Krieps, a dazzling Luxembourg actress discovered alongside Daniel Day-Lewis in Phantom Thread (2017), by Paul Thomas Anderson, suggested to Austrian filmmaker Marie Kreutzer, with whom she had filmed We Used to Be Cool (2016), to make a film out of it.
The director then plunged into long research on the one who was immortalized in a series of blue flower films, by Ernst Marischka, in the 1950s, under the graceful features of Romy Schneider, who took over the role in Ludwig. duskule of the gods (1973), biographical drama by Visconti dedicated to Ludwig II of Bavaria, beloved cousin of Sissi. What more was she going to say about this historical figure who inspired so many others before her?
In 2004, Arielle Dombasle lent her her slender figure in Sissi, the rebel empress, a modest TV movie by Jean-Daniel Verhaeghe, who recounted his last days before being assassinated, at the age of 60, by an Italian anarchist. Recently, two large-scale German series revisited the fate of the Bavarian little duchess, Sisi (Tou.tv) and The Empress (Netflix), where the sensuality and non-conformity of the character were brought to the fore.
Freely inspired by the true story of Sissi, Marie Kreutzer gave herself up to a very personal interpretation of the Empress who had nothing to do with the monarchy, reduced to playing the pretty vases with her husband, the Emperor Franz Joseph (Florian Teichtmeister). As she prepares to celebrate her 40th birthday on December 24, 1878, Sissi has only one thing in mind: run away!
The art of running away
Knowing that she had become old in the eyes of society, especially in the eyes of men, who did not hesitate to point out her drawn features, her less luminous complexion and her thickening figure, she set about fighting fiercely against the pangs of time. Faithful to her habits, she practiced gymnastics, brisk walking, horse riding, forced herself to follow a strict diet, asked her maids to tighten her corset more tightly and jealously took care of her long hair, her great pride. Tired of being invisible to her husband, she searches for desire in the eyes of her lovers, including Englishman Bay Middleton (Colin Morgan), to whom she confesses that she enjoys watching him watching her.
In order to ensure that no one witnesses her fading beauty, she refuses to be combed or photographed and presents herself masked to her subjects. She goes so far as to ask one of her ladies-in-waiting (Katharina Lorenz), on whom she imposes a Spartan lifestyle, to take her place during public appearances. To her cousin Louis (Manuel Rubey), she explains with a laugh how she escapes rude comments about her physique.
The one who has long been one of the most beautiful women in Europe and a fashion icon is suffocating. It is therefore this aspect that Marie Kreutzer explores in complete freedom, which allows Sissi to make gestures expressing her anger, sometimes an arm of honor, sometimes a cry of rage in front of the camera of Louis Le Prince (Finnegan Oldfield ). In doing so, she turns Sissi into a monster of narcissism who cares little for the grumbling of the people and the slow agony of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
reminding Marie Antoinetteby Sofia Coppola, and spencerby Pablo Larrain, unconventional portraits of tormented crowned heads, Bodice certainly includes amusing passages where Sissi, embodied with fervor by Vicky Krieps, flouts conventions with a cigarette and a smirk on her lips. The fact remains that the film distills the boredom that eats away at the depressed Empress. While Sissi constantly flees from one place to another to escape her golden prison, a feeling of oppression crushes the viewer.
Having preferred sobriety to opulence, the filmmaker sketches a portrait with melancholic hues, bathed in the twilight light of Judith Kaufmann and lulled by the hypnotic music of Camille, through which she presents a chilling reflection on the dictatorship of beauty. If she offers Sissi to finally take her destiny in hand with brilliance, to alleviate her misfortunes, the last liberating gesture of the Empress will leave more than one speechless and pensive.