엘비라 마디건은 오래전에 봤던 영화다. 내용도 알고 있고 해피엔딩이 아닌까닭에 다소 망설이기는 했지만 결국 보기 시작했던 까닭은 모짜르트 피아노협주곡 21번때문이다. 200년전에 발표된 모짜르트의 곡이 엘비라 마디건으로 불리운 까닭은 바로 50년전에 만들어진 이 영화때문이다. 그냥 들어도 좋지만 특히 어울리는 배경과 같이 보면 훨씬 그 효과는 커지기 마련이다.
인간은 누구나 먹고 자고 입어야 한다. 사랑때문에 그것을 버리고 떠난 그녀와 식스텐은 결국 짧지만 행복한 시간을 권총으로 마감해야 했다. 그들은 귀족적인 삶의 수준과 평민의 사랑을 동시에 원했다. 하지만 세상은 만사가 제맘대로 되지는 않는다. 귀족적인 삶을 원한다면 사랑을 포기해야 하고 사랑을 원한다면 수준을 낮춰야 한다. 하나만 선택했다면 그들의 삶은 훨씬 행복했을 것이다.
Elvira Madigan is a 1967Swedish film directed by Bo Widerberg, based on the tragedy of the Danishtightrope dancer Hedvig Jensen (born 1867), working under the stage name of Elvira Madigan at her stepfather's travelling circus, who runs away with the Swedish nobleman lieutenant Sixten Sparre (born 1854).
Elvira Madigan and Sixten Sparre are together in the Danish countryside. Sixten has renounced the military and now claims to be "on the women's side." Elvira, who was the main attraction at her circus, has got her identity back and starts to refer to herself with her real name Hedvig.
A friend from Sixten's regiment tries to persuade him to come back, but fails. They have no money or future and try to fish and earn money the best they can. Hedvig sells a picture of herself drawn by Toulouse-Lautrec and is paid to entertain a party with her dancing. But the situation becomes more desperate, and finally they see death as their only option.
An unnamed reviewer in the Time Out Film Guide writes: "Candidate for the prettiest pic ever award. ... you may be enchanted by it if you don't laugh yourself sick."[6] Describing it as breathing the "hippie mid-sixties", Edgardo Cozarinsky writes: "Though the lovers are there as early instances of drop-outs, and several contemporary readings effortlessly emerge, Widerberg's real concern is with the sensuous presence of cream and berry juice on lips and fingertips". For Widerberg, "this affirmation in the face of death carries ... the weight of a modest but combative ideological point".[7]
Jump up ^Time Out Film Guide 2009, 2008, Time Out Guides, p312; Time Out Chicagowebsite.
Jump up ^Edgardo Cozarinsky "Bo Widerberg and Swedish Cinema since 1960", in Richard Roud (ed) Cinema: A Critical Dictionary: The Major Film-Makers, Volume Two, Kinugasa to Zanussi, 1980, London: Secker & Warburg, p1077