Austrian filmmaker, producer and composer Hannes Schalle has a deep understanding of his native country’s culture, including two key examples of its soft power influence on the world: the Christmas carol Silent Night and the Hollywood classic The Sound of Music. With the Christmas season upon us, Schalle shares his insights with The International.
by Alexei Korolyov
“When I first came to the US in 1982, Austria wasn’t very well known, and I know it sounds like a bad joke but people really mixed it up with Australia.” Hannes Schalle – and Austria – have come a long way since then. “Ten years later, in a cab in New York, the driver asked me where I was from, and I replied: Austria, the country of Arnold Schwarzenegger. And then he said: of course, I know that Austria. Is there another Austria?” A celebrated director of both feature films and documentaries, as well as a producer and film score composer, Schalle has, arguably, played his part in this transformation (though he never worked with the former governor of California). His two most recent films, Silent Night – A Song for the World and an upcoming documentary marking the 60th anniversary of the Hollywood classic The Sound of Music, are not, strictly speaking, intended as promotional pieces for Austria. Yet they shine a fresh light on the country, raising questions about what Austrian culture means and exploring its broader contributions to the world.
Silent Night
In terms of cultural impact, Silent Night – or, to give it its original German title, Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht – might well rival Mozart or Schwarzenegger as Austria’s most successful export. Yet many Austrians remain unaware of its origins. The carol, a staple of Christmas festivities around the world, emerged in the early 19th century, the creation of two Austrians: Franz Xaver Gruber, a schoolteacher and church organist near Salzburg, and Joseph Mohr, a priest and writer from the same region, who wrote the original German lyrics. Schalle’s 2018 documentary, made to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the carol, not only highlights its humble beginnings (“I showed how life was in 1818, it was a horrible time; none of us would have liked to live then”), but also traces the song’s journey to becoming the global phenomenon (and a UNESCO intangible heritage) it is today. The turning point came with Bing Crosby’s 1935 English-language rendition, followed by countless versions in multiple languages. “Everybody knows this song, and it has become a sort of public message for peace.” The film features several versions of the song, including performances by Austria’s own Vienna Boys’ Choir, Italian rock star Zucchero Fornaciari and American pop sensation Kelly Clarkson. Schalle also staged a detailed reenactment of the famous Christmas truce that occurred between German and British soldiers on 24 December 1914, during the early stages of the First World War. With 200 extras and special effects, the scene showed the soldiers singing the carol across no man’s land between the trenches, followed by an exchange of gifts and even a friendly game of football.
The Sound of Music
But it is Schalle’s upcoming 2025 documentary about the origins of The Sound of Music – probably the most famous film ever made about Austria – that takes centre stage in his efforts to change perceptions of his homeland. A 1965 American production shot on location in Salzburg, The Sound of Music won five Oscars and tells the story of a spirited trainee nun, Maria (played by Julie Andrews), who is hired to take care of the seven von Trapp children in a Salzburg castle. She proceeds to thaw the heart of their widowed father, Captain von Trapp, before the family makes a daring escape across the Alps to Switzerland during Austria’s annexation by Nazi Germany in the 1938 Anschluss. Based on true events, all of this unfolds to the accompaniment of such classic songs as My Favourite Things and Sixteen Going on Seventeen.
While they may have heard of it, most Austrians aren’t familiar with the film or the story behind it, Schalle says. What’s more, he adds, his compatriots seem to harbour a certain hostility towards it. Part of the reason may lie in its very foreignness – like another great film about Austria, The Third Man, this is, after all, a foreign production – but the dislike may run deeper. While the film’s foreground tells a personal story, its backdrop is the rise of Nazism. The events in the book on which the film is based, a 1949 memoir by Maria von Trapp, are actually less dramatic than the film suggests, but still, the historical context may unsettle some. There is also the fact that the film inevitably oversimplifies the complexity of Austrian history and society in the years leading up to the Second World War.
“When I was preparing to make the documentary, the Austrian Tourism Board asked me: how can you help the Austrians and Germans get more acquainted with The Sound of Music?” Schalle says. “I think, not just with this film but over the years as well, I have always wanted to show how culture, especially through music, helps society. And you can indeed call this a mission.”
The film features interviews with the surviving members of the von Trapp family, who now live in the US state of Vermont, where they run the Trapp Family Lodge, as well as with some of the cast from the original 1965 film. “They described what they feel about the film now and what it has made of their lives, because some of them became very successful, while others stopped acting.” The von Trapps, especially the younger ones who were born in the US – where the family emigrated in real life – still feel a connection to Austria, and specifically to Salzburg. “We made a lot of drone shots of the Trapp Lodge, and it looks like the area around Salzburg, and I understand that: people always look for similarities to where they came from.”
‘We Are Promoting Dust’
Despite his own fascination with Austria’s past – Silent Night and The Sound of Music being just two examples – Schalle is critical of the broader tendency in Austrian cultural production to look back to former glories, such as those of classical music or iconic culinary dishes. “We had great new Viennese culture with people like Falco or Kruder & Dorfmeister, but now again we are only promoting Mozart and the strudel and the Sachertorte. And I know this sounds tough, but we are promoting our dust.” Yet it’s not as grim as all that. With the Austrian state still supporting arthouse and critical-minded filmmakers like Jessica Hausner (whose well-known works include Lovely Rita, Lourdes and Amour Fou), Schalle thinks there is still a thriving undercurrent of bold, innovative culture in Austria. “When I was in my 20s, I thought Austria was the worst place in the world: boring, not innovative. But times have changed, and I believe I have made my own contribution to that change.”
