Karyn Kusama Presents LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

ABOUT THE FILM

Was there ever a more swooningly romantic film than Max Ophüls’ American masterpiece? This is a love story that sidesteps all the sentimental Hollywood contrivances too often afflicting movie romances of the era. Shy young Lisa (Joan Fontaine) grows into womanhood while nurturing a lifelong love-from-afar for debonair composer and worldly lothario Stefan Brand (Louis Jourdan), who lives upstairs in her building. Even after she enjoys a brief tryst with Brand, Lisa’s dreams seem destined to evaporate into thin air. Ophüls’ device of Brand, finally learning of Lisa’s deep feelings from a letter to him as he readies for a duel at dawn, bookends the narrative with a tragic anguish that is extremely moving.

FORMAT: 35mm preservation print courtesy of the UCLA Film & Television Archive

DISTRIBUTOR: Paramount