In the fictional country of Kronberg, the cruel and wicked bitch queen Regina V is due to marry the womanising drunkard Prince Wolfram. One morning, Wolfram arrives home at the palace wasted and covered in sluts. In her anger, the Queen hurls a cat to the floor which immediately has a fight with a sausage dog. They don’t make ‘em like this anymore.
As punishment, the Prince is sent to take the army out for a walk where he encounters a healthy collection of orphans and nuns. The prettiest of the orphans (Kelly) has unknowingly dropped her knickers which Wolfram and the rest of the army find hilarious. Out of embarrassment, she throws them at him and he keeps them for later. We know this is probably the start of something beautiful.
Back at the palace Queen Bitch decides to bring the wedding forward a day, much to Wolfram’s dismay as he would rather get his hands on the orphan with the loose knickers. That night he goes to find her at the convent, but gets frustrated by the amount of rooms she could be in. He decides the best course of action is to burn the place down. It works and he finds her, although she is unconscious because of all the smoke. He carries her home and steals more of her clothes. She wakes up, dazed and confused and the Prince romantically tells her that he burned down a convent.
Amazingly, this works and they get it on. Maybe I should be setting fire to more convents. Life’s not all fun and games though and they are discovered by Queen Bitch who looks the Prince in his chambers and starts whipping Kelly. I’m kind of on the Queen’s side a bit. We’re only told she’s cruel, we’re never shown any evidence or informed of any specifics. If my future husband set fire to a convent and slept with an orphan, I’d probably get a bit whippy too.
Anyway, Kelly gets chased out of the palace and jumps into the river. Which is where the film runs out of money. Director Erich von Stroheim was sacked because he was spending too much and leading lady Gloria Swanson didn’t like the direction that the film was heading in. For a start it was going to be 5 HOURS LONG. It was never released in the United States, but there are two possible endings. The one I saw is as follows:
Kelly is rescued from the river and taken back to the convent where she receives a telegram ordering her to move to German East Africa to live in her dying Auntie’s whorehouse where she will be forced to marry this dreamboat:
Meanwhile, back in Kronberg, Queen Bitch has been assassinated and Prince Wolfram heads to Africa. When he arrives, Kelly has replaced her Aunt as madam, but it all ends happily and they get married after dreamboat gets killed in a bar. We don’t really see any of this as it doesn’t exist. There’s just a lot of text and some still photographs.
The other ending, which I think I would prefer, has Kelly not being rescued from the river. She dies. The Prince ends up in an unhappy marriage with Queen Bitch and the people of the kingdom of Kronberg suffer as a result. I love a happy ending.
Despite my cynical jabs, I enjoyed this motion picture. It’s funny, exciting, looks pretty and tells a good story. Most problems can be overlooked due to the fact that it’s 83 years old. But there is a major issue. It’s not finished. So which ever ending you see, it’s been tacked on the end and feels hurried. You will be ultimately unfulfilled. In conclusion, Queen Kelly is
NOT BAD
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