Tea at Trianon: Lola Montes (1955)

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Lola Montes (1955)

Catherine Delors reviews the entrancing French classic film about the Irish courtesan who ignited a revolution. As Madame Delors describes:

Eliza Gilbert, Countess of Landsfeld, better known under her stage name of Lola Montes, or Montez, was a 19^th century Irish dancer and courtesan whose adventures spanned Asia, Europe, America and Australia. She had little talent for dance, but a great deal for scandal and self-publicity. She may be most famous for becoming the mistress of King Louis I of Bavaria. Their liaison was one of the causes of the 1848 Bavarian revolution and led to the King’s abdication. After that episode, her career as a high-flying courtesan came to an end, though she launched many other ventures. She did not, as in the film, end in a circus show, though the truth is hardly more glamorous: she suffered a crippling stroke and died of pneumonia in a New York boarding-house at the age of 40.

The film opens with Lola as the “star” of the circus act that presents her life as a series of live tableaux. Her beauty, intact under her tawdry make-up, has become the stuff of freak shows. The dramatic tension rests on how she gets there. We never see her physically growing up or aging. Lola, whether a teenager or reaching the end of her short life, retains throughout the film the 35-year old face of the sex symbol of 1950s French cinema, Martine Carol.

More about the infamous Lola, HERE.

tubbs said...: Thank you for that interesting post. My favorite Irish courtesan will always be that belle of the Deer Park, Boucher's favorite model, Peggy O'Murphy.; November 14, 2010 at 1:42:00 PM EST