Wolfgang Menardi
Beauty and the Beast is the adaptation of a story by Madame de Villeneuve. Published anonymously in 1740 as La Jeune Américaine et les contes marins, it paints a portrait of Belle, a joyful and touching young girl who falls in love with the Beast, a cursed creature in search of love and redemption. In 1760, a condensed children’s version was published. It was from this version that Jean Cocteau and then Walt Disney drew their famous adaptations. Overshadowed, the original version by Madame de Villeneuve has never been adapted for the screen... until now!
Set in the 1800s when Napoleon’s French ruled Europe, the film follows young Austrian carpenter Franz and his Bavarian wife, Katharina as an unforeseen event forces them to flee from Augsburg, Bavaria for Franz’s family home in Tyrol, Austria. Tyrolian sentiment is rising strongly against Napoleon and trouble is stirring. In no time it sweeps up Franz and his brothers along with the whole town.
In an attempt to save their troubled relationship, Stefan (Wolfgang Menardi) and Claudia (Stephanie Schönfeld) go on a camping trip to the coast. They pick up Uli (Norman Schenk), a professional puppeteer who turns out to be quite entertaining. But when the puppet develops a life of its own, and Stefan seems to remember Uli from the past, they are already caught up in a mysterious and dangerous game.
If things were up to General Donovan, then the Military Secret Service of the United States would take care of really important things, of which there are plenty in this Autumn of 1942. Let the Waffen-SS search for Atlantis and dance around Germanic Druid Stones - who believes in the occult of "Wunderwaffen" or "miracle weapons" anyway? At least no straightforward American patriot, only pathetic wimps like William Blazkowicz, the only person at the OSS who wears glasses. But then ... can you dare risk to ignore explicit warnings? Secretly shot films? Evidence? What is really happening in Kottlitz Castle? Who killed Smokey Savallas? What kind of research is the "Ahnenerbe der SS" involved in? Who stole Count Dracula's bones from a crypt in Wallachia? And where's the connection between a fanatic SS General, underground laboratories full of German scientists, and a huge pit filled with molten gold? Questions, questions ...
Inge arrives at the palace. Something disturbs her. An uncanny experience has left its mark. Viktor, the assistant of the count, shows her to the countess. Inge has to tell her of the terrible incident. A little, mean picture, colored with postmodern sensations.
