Letter from an Unknown Woman

Set in Vienna around 1900, this romantic drama follows Stefan Brand, a celebrated but aging pianist who is preparing to leave the city to avoid a duel. Before he can depart, his servant brings him a letter written by a woman he does not recognize. In it, Lisa Berndle recounts the love she has felt for him since her youth, describing the brief moments they shared and the course her life took afterward, and revealing that she is writing as she nears death. As he reads, Stefan is confronted with the ways his own past fits into her account.

Max Ophüls directed and Howard Koch wrote the screenplay, with John Houseman producing. The film came roughly midway through the run of features Ophüls made, following Liebelei (1933) and preceding Caught (1949), Le Plaisir (1952), The Earrings of Madame de... (1953) and Lola Montès (1955). Joan Fontaine plays Lisa opposite Louis Jourdan as Stefan, and the credited cast of 21 also includes Mady Christians, Marcel Journet, Art Smith and Carol Yorke. Running 87 minutes, it received a critics' rating of 9.1/10 from 25 reviews. On IMDb it holds 7.8/10 from around 15,000 votes, and on TMDB it is also rated 7.8/10, from roughly 350 votes.