Synopse
DOCUMENTARY Douglas Sirk was the master of cinematic melodrama. This fascinating, emotional portrait reveals that the ultimate melodrama was Sirk’s own life. It is the key to understanding his work. He discovered Zarah Leander and made her a star in the mid-1930s. Later, in the USA, he catapulted Rock Hudson from no-name to screen icon. And in the 1950s Douglas Sirk reinvented the melodrama. But who was the man who suddenly left Hollywood at the height of his fame and moved to Switzerland? In interviews with among others Todd Haynes and hitherto unpublished excerpts from his wife’s diaries, the film gets closer to this mysterious genius. We discover a life story marked by hope, disillusionment, love and death.
Regie
ROMAN HÜBEN (*1990 in Cologne) grew up in Switzerland and graduated in 2014 from the ECAL art school in Lausanne. Douglas Sirk – Hope as in Despair is his first full-length documentary.
Presented by ARTE
Info
Original Title: Douglas Sirk - Hope as in Despair
Category: Documentary feature
Section: Kaleidoskop
Version & Subtitles: French, German, English OV with German subtitles
Director: Roman Hüben
Cast/Protagonists: Protagonist*innen/Protagonists: Todd Haynes, Jon Halliday, Bernard Eisenschitz, Denis Rossano, Hanna Schygulla
Production country: France, Germany, Switzerland
Year of Production: 2022
Length: 76 min
Producer: Nicola Genni, Stefan Pannen, Christophe Gougeon, Fabrizio Polpettini
Production company: Picfilm
Sound: Camille Bonard, Timothée Zurbuchen, Riccardo Studer
co-production company: Berlin Producers Media, Acqua Alta, La Bête
World Sales: Picfilm
