Der Junge Törless
Germany,
1966, 87 min
Shown in 1966
CREDITS
- dir
-
Volker Schlöndorff
- prod
-
Fran Seitz, Louis Malle, Franz Achter
- scr
-
Volker Schlöndorff
- cam
-
Franz Rath
- editor
-
Claus von Boro
- mus
-
Hans Werner Henze
- cast
-
Mathieu Carrière, Bernd Tischer, Marian Seidowsky, Barbara Steele, Alfred Dietz, Lotte Ledl
- prod co
-
Franz Seitz Filmproduktion; Nouvelles Éditions de Films
- source
-
UFA-International GmbH
-
COMMENTS
Young Volker Schlöndorff and Barbara Steele in person.
OTHER
When Musil's celebrated study of adolescent passivism and sadism was rediscovered during the 1950s, it revealed an extraordinarily apt sense of prophecy regarding the inexplicable tolerance of the German people toward the Hitler regime. This faithful screen version of the novel is a major work of the new German cinema, and the director makes a brilliant debut here. The story centers around Törless, handsome, detached and vain. When he arrives at a private boys' school in Germany before World War I, he adopts an attitude of philosophical objectivity, accepting life as an abstract force over which he has no control. A student steals some money from another and is discovered by two upperclassmen who subsequently blackmail and torture him to satisfy their sadistic interests. Törless finds himself a part of this ritual, and his solution to his problem of inaction becomes the dramatic conflict of the story. Schlöndorff's film is stark, almost documentary in its approach to Törless' world, one which intellectualizes the domination of man over mankind. The boys in the cast are all nonprofessional performers, but each one exemplifies the type described by Musil in his novel, and Mathieu Carrière's performance as Törless is a perfect example of youth, making philosophy out of a glance or a careless gesture.
—Albert Johnson
FACTOID #61
The first repertory film screened at Festival was The Bluebird (1940), based on Maurice Maeterlinck’s play, showed October 23, 1965, with Shirley Temple Black in person to discuss her role in the film.
