Iris Ashley
2021
The Student's Romance
Otto Kanturek
Grete Natzler, Patric Knowles
A Student's Romance was based on the operetta I Lost My Heart in Heidelburg, which in turn owed a lot to that old chestnut The Student Prince. In 1825, impoverished composer Max (Patric Knowles) enrolls at Heidelburg University. Local girl Veronika (Carol Goodner) falls in love with Max, helping him to finance his education and clear his debts. Alas, Veronika is left out in the cold when Max becomes enamored with gorgeous tourist Helene (Grete Natzler). Little does he know that Helene is the daughter of the Grand Duke (Ivan Simpson), meaning of course that their romance is doomed to disappointment. Leading lady Grete Natzler later changed her screen name to Della Lynd, and under that cognomen co-starred with Laurel & Hardy in Swiss Miss (1938).
The Student's Romance
I Give My Heart
Marcel Varnel
Gitta Alpar, Patrick Waddington
The Loves of Madame du Barry was the American title of the 1935 British operetta I Give My Heart, based on the stage musical The Du Barry. German actress Gitta Alpar stars as Jeanne, the young 18th century Parisian milliner who sleeps her way to the uppermost rungs of French aristocracy, emerging at last as the glamorous Madame du Barry, mistress of Louis XV (Owen Nares). Refusing to gloss over du Barry's sexual peccadilloes (as previous films with Norma Talmadge and Dolores del Rio had done), the film presents the "heroine" as a whore, pure and simple-or, on second thought, not so pure and simple! Particularly troublesome for American censors was a scene in which du Barry is depicted as a resident of a bawdy house. Otherwise, The Loves of Madame du Barry is standard historical-drama fare, allowing dozens of top European actors to play "dress-up" for 90 minutes.
I Give My Heart
