Produced in 1943 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Germany's Ufa Studios, Baron Munchausenwas a big-budget spectacular--one of Germany's first color films--with many of Germany's most famous screen stars in cameo roles. After World War II the prints deteriorated rapidly and the film was considered lost. The German government, however, was able to collect prints from all over the world, and spent over a million and a half marks to restore the film frame-by-frame and create a new negative.
The restored film ranks alongside Thief of Bagdad and The Wizard of Oz as one of the classic screen fantasies. The Baron (Hans Albers) has returned to his ancestral home after a long absence. Following a costume ball--which belies the film's contemporary setting--he entertains a young couple with tales of his illustrious ancestor. The tales of his travels to Russia, Turkey, Venice and the Moon are more romantic than fantastic, and Albers is a much younger and more swashbuckling hero than in Gilliam's version (which in many ways is a sequel to this film.) In Russia he becomes the consort of Catherine the Great. He rescues a Viennese princess from a Turkish harem, only to lose her when she is kidnaped and imprisoned in a convent. He makes his first trip to the Moon, and finally sacrifices his own immortality to grow old with the woman he loves.
The trick photography is wondrous--paintings come alive, a frozen horn begins playing as it thaws by the fire, Moon children grow on trees like fruit--all done with techniques reminiscent of the classic silents. But the fantastic is only a backdrop for romance. The film is not so much concerned with the triumph of fantasy over reality--as is the case with Gillian's film--as in showing the power of love to overcome all obsticles.