MovieChat Forums > Fall of Eagles (1974) Discussion > A little trivia

A little trivia

posted 16 years ago by artisticengineer
5 replies | jump to latest

In the next to last episode; when the Archduke is assassinate in Sarajevo and war is declared (World War I) there is a short segment which shows a young family seated at an outdoor restaurant. The man (husband) was Karl,an Austrian army Captain (I think that was his rank) who was the grandnephew of Franz Joseph and was thereby "promoted" as he came after the Duke in the line to the Hapsburg throne. The assassination put him next to Emperor Franz Joseph, who was a very elderly man even then.

Anyway, also at the table is shown the man's wife. That is the portrayal of Zita; she became Emperoress when Karl became Karl the 1st a couple of years later after Franz Joseph died. Zita was still alive when "Fall of Eagles" was made; and, I believe she was the only portrayed individual who was still alive during the filming.

[–] Selebii 16 years ago

Sadly the later Emperor Karl was not portrayed as the tough soldier he was, not to mention the ONLY head of state during the Great War with any truly good hope for peace.

[–] jdcofield 15 years ago

That episode Indian Summer of an Emperor is one of the least well done in the whole series. The Karl and Zita sequence just seems to be thrown in for no good reason.

[–] artisticengineer 15 years ago

Agreed. I suspect that the producers were initially going to show more of Karl when he became emperor; perhaps showing his attempting negotiations with the Allies to bring the war to an earlier end. They may not have produced any further scenes when they realized that the mini-series did not have much more time left. Kinda wish they had cut some of the scenes showing Lenin taking over control of the Communist Party and had used that time for some more scenes of Karl.

[–] bittermilk2 10 years ago

Could someone help me with the meaning of "Indian Summer"? Why was this used for a title of an episode? I tried to find out but it's not easy.

[–] Rosabel 10 years ago

I always took it to be a sort of pun. It WAS summer when the events took place. But "Indian Summer" is an expression we have in North America (and Europe too, I think) for some unseasonably warm days that occur in the fall. It feels like summer, but in fact, summer is over and this is just a little interlude before the cold settles in. In the same way, the Austrian Empire still felt as if it were strong and at the top of its game, but in fact, it was already over and on the way down.

Flat, drab passion meanders across the screen!