Decades ago I discovered by accident Masquerade In Vienna (1934) aka Maskerade. Possibly the finest film made about the charm that once was old Austria. Forst was first an actor and then grew into a writer, director and producer. He stayed in Germany during the thirties and did not help the Nazis. As far as I could tell he tried to celebrate the charm of his childhood memories of Austria. As the years went by he grew as a storyteller and in my opinion ranks alongside other polished stylist of graceful cinema, Ernst Lubitsch and Max Ophuls. As for the story of this particular film let me use this description... SPOILERS: This German crime drama was based on a true story. WillI Forst stars as a poverty- stricken Italian glazier (Vincenzo Peruggia) who falls in love with French hotel maid Mathilde played by Trude von Molo. Struck by the girl's resemblance to Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, he manages to steal the painting from the Louvre in hopes of impressing his sweetheart. But when the girl proves to be a fickle sort, the crestfallen hero confesses his crime and is carted off to jail. Unwilling to admit that he'd been led astray by a woman, Forst claims that he stole the Mona Lisa to restore it to his native Italy, and as a result is hailed as a national hero! Raub der Mona Lisa was distributed in the U.S. by RKO Radio, under the title The Theft of the Mona Lisa. One reviewer put it this way... DER Raub der Mona Lisa" (The Theft of the Mona Lisa)—a moving picture with an original plot idea! The reaction of the critic is to rush out and call a meeting of earnest thanksgiving for this unique gift of the gods. Not that there are not plenty of novel ideas displayed in the making of films. Actors occasionally have a few and directors are overstuffed with them. But if a scenario writer proposes an original theme, it has to go through the mill of the scenario conferences, the objections of the production managers, the revisions of the director and the demands of the leading players. So it usually comes out squashed back into one of the old formulas. All the more credit to the Superfilm that they let Walter Reisch's manuscript get through so completely intact.
For in this "Mona Lisa" film the "hero" is no hero at all, and the "heroine" is anything but that. The chief male figure is a sympathetic but very weak and sentimental young man, while the female is attractive but quite cold-hearted. And there is no lingering embrace to close the picture—the hero gets a jail sentence and the heroine a nice stinging moral slap in the face.
In detail, the story is this: A young Italian glazier living in Paris is commissioned to set glass over the Mona Lisa and is fascinated by the picture. A new maid in the house opposite him has a very strong resemblance to the woman of the painting and the youth falls in love with her. The girl is interested in him, as she believes him to be a rich young artist, but drops him immediately she finds out his real position in life. In order to do something to impress her, he steals the Mona Lisa from the Louvre. But she does not believe that he is the thief and goes away with a traveling salesman. Although the police are up in the air about the robbery, an agent sent by an American millionaire to buy the painting ferrets out the thief and makes him a stupendous offer for the picture. But he turns it down and sets out on a crazy journey to Italy with the painting strapped to a hurdy-gurdy. He offers the picture to a dealer in Florence for a paltry sum, but the American agent, who has been following him, now notifies the police, and he is arrested. The girl learns from the papers that he really did steal the painting for her and appears in the court room, hoping to be made the center of interest by his confession. But when the youth does speak, he states that his reason for the theft was to be revenged on Napoleon, who had stolen so many works of art from Italy. Although the judges have to sentence him, the Italians believe and make a hero of him. And the girl is left completely out of it, her vanity deeply wounded.
And how charmingly Gezy von Bolvary, the director of "Zwei Herzen im Dreiviertel Takt," has set this story onto the screen! It is always light and pictorial, the dangerous moments of sentimentality are skillfully avoided. For the connoisseur of film technique there are innumerable delicate touches. Willi Forst, whom you will probably remember from Bolvary's earlier pictures, was by no means ideal for the Italian, but his pleasing quality and his sense of the picturesque keep the part discreetly within the frame. And Trude von Molo brings all the beauty that was needed for the Mona Lisa's double.
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