Everything starts off quite idyllic: It's summer and therefore high season at Lake Wörthersee in Austria. Maria Alsbacher (Sybille SCHMITZ) runs a fully booked luxury hotel and lovingly looks after her almost grown-up children (Hardy KRÜGER, Gaby FEHLING) and her terminally ill husband (Albrecht SCHOENHALS). Lydia Bauer (Hildegard KNEF) from Munich, who vacationed in the hotel with her parents as a child, has been part of the extended family circle for years. Despite the serious illness of the older father, the mood is cheerful and exuberant.
One summer later things look different. Her father and husband have since died, and Maria Alsbacher is like many women after the war. She is middle-aged, the children are grown, and she is alone. Should she be a widow for the rest of her life? No, she is with the windy singer Monsieur Gidou (Maurice TEYNAC), of whom Lydia and Maria's children know exactly what kind of filou the philanderer is. Paul and Lydia do everything they can to prevent the impending wedding of Maria and the windy Gidou. But there is more than just one difficulty...
ILLUSION IN MOLL by Rudolf JUGERT, which was produced by GOLDEN GLOBE winner Erich POMMER (in 1956 he won for CHILDREN, MOTHERS AND A GENERAL), is a very interesting example of the huge output of the West German film industry of those years. An entertainment film and a melodrama at the same time! With this unexpected melodramatic seriousness, the film follows on from the UFA melodramas of Detlef SIERCK with Zarah LEANDER and thus serves an almost original genre of German-language film. But there are also differences. Now known in Hollywood as Douglas SIRK, the German-born melodrama specialist definitely allows for a happy ending between an older woman and a younger man, as can be seen in the films made at the same time with ACADEMY AWARD winner Jane WYMAN and ACADEMY AWARD nominee Rock HUDSON.
The West German audience of the 1950s could probably not be expected to do something like that. Here an older woman and mother of a family had to fall for a younger Hallodri. This is a pity! Especially since UFA star Sybille SCHMITZ (1909 - 1955) plays it brilliantly. Shortly after this film, the actress (TITANIC, 1943) must have fallen into the fatal addiction in real life that Rainer Werner FASSBINDER so aptly dissected in his film THE DESIRE OF VERONIKA VOSS (Golden Bear at the 1982 Berlin Film Festival). Of course, there were also dark sides in the West German film industry, which we now know well enough from Hollywood.
Hildegard KNEF, who has now established herself as a global star (DECISION BEFORE DAWN / THE SNOWS OF KILIMANDSCHARO / DIPLOMATIC COURIER) and the future global star Hardy KRÜGER (GOLDEN GLOBE nominee 1966 for THE FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX) harmonize magnificently with each other and leave complexities behind the radiant, young surface. Hildegard KNEF sings two beautiful songs, ILLUSIONEN and DU BIST WUNDERBAR (in a duet with Maurice TEYNAC). Two years later, KNEF was successful as Hildegarde NEFF in the NINOTSCHKA musical SILK STOCKINGS on New York's Broadway and further solidified her status as a global star.
The film was shot on Lake Wörthersee and in the BAVARIA film studios in Munich. Other roles include GERMAN FILM AWARD winner Nadja TILLER (she won the award for LABYRINTH in 1960), Lina CARSTENS and Robert GRAF (the father of director Dominik GRAF).
By the way, the French version of the two songs sung by KNEF was sung by the Swiss singer Lys ASSIA. In 1956, Lys ASSIA was supposed to win the very first EUROVISION Song Contest in Lugano.
