Immortal Beloved
Short description
Immortal Beloved is a drama about the death of Ludwig van Beethoven in 1827 and the mystery he leaves behind. In his papers, a letter names a woman only as his "immortal beloved," to whom he has left his estate. Against the wishes of the composer's family, his friend and secretary Anton Schindler sets out to identify her, weighing the testimony of the women Beethoven knew. The search unfolds alongside the story of the composer's life, from his early years to his growing deafness, which changed both his work and his relationships.
Bernard Rose directed and wrote the film, which came after his 1992 feature Inside Out 4 and before Anna Karenina in 1997, the fifth of fourteen films he directed. Gary Oldman plays Beethoven, with Jeroen Krabbé as Schindler. Isabella Rossellini, Johanna ter Stege, Marco Hofschneider and Miriam Margolyes appear among the cast of thirty-seven. Bruce Davey produced.
The film runs 121 minutes. On IMDb it holds a critics' rating of 6.2 out of 10 from 56 reviews, while on TMDB audience voters give it 7.1 out of 10 from around 380 votes, so viewers rate it more warmly than reviewers did.
What's left behind the scenes
- The film was made with the support of Czech filmmakers; Zlatá Praha and its suburbs stood in for all the European cities indicated in the script, and the production designer was the well-known Czech set designer Jiří Hlupech.
- Anthony Hopkins was initially considered for the composer role, but the producers settled on Oldman, who, incidentally, also played the piano on screen: it is his hobby.
- Beethoven's music is performed by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Georg Solti.
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