Fanfaren der Liebe / Fanfares of Love

Kurt Hoffmann: Fanfaren der Liebe (DE 1951). Dieter Borsche (Hans), Ilse Petri (Sabine) and Oskar Sima (Hallinger).

Lemmen serenadi / Kärlekstrumpeten (Swedish title in Finland) / Oss kvinnor emellan (Swedish title in Sweden) / Fanfares of Love (Inter Nationes title). 

    DE 1951. PC: Neue Deutsche Filmgesellschaft. P: Harald Braun. 

    D: Kurt Hoffmann. SC: Heinz Pauck - based on the story by Robert T. Thoeren and Michael Logan (1935). DP: Richard Angst. M: Franz Grothe. Lyrics: Willy Dahmel. 

    Starring Dieter Borsche (Hans), Inge Egger (Gaby), Grethe Weiser (Lydia), Kurt Thomalla (Peter), Oskar Sima (Hallinger), Ilse Petri (Sabine). 

    91 min. 

    Based on: Fanfare d'amour / Hollantilaiset tulppaanit (FR 1935), D: Richard Pottier.
    Fortsetzung: Fanfaren der Ehe (DE 1953)

    Helsinki premiere: 16 Jan 1953, Ritz, released by Suomi-Filmi

    A Goethe Institut print with English subtitles viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 16 September 2008.

The print looks at first slightly too softly duped (even digitally mastered?) but there are better passages later, or maybe the eye just gets adapted.

The second film version of Thoeren and Logan's story that finally transformed into Some Like It Hot. The story is to a high degree familiar. Two unemployed musicians are ready for almost anything, they become Gypsies, Blacks... and finally women, and board the night train to the Alps, where they join the all-woman band Die Alpenveilchen (The Alpine Violets). The bachelor's dream or nightmare?

Even the characters of Hans and Peter have similarities to the performances of Lemmon and Curtis.

Grethe Weiser is very nice as Lydia.

Billy Wilder crafted a diamond-sharp masterpiece of the material, Marilyn Monroe became an immortal Sugar Kane, and Lemmon and Curtis had a high comic charge. Fanfaren der Liebe is just a nice regular musical comedy.