Talk:The Mephisto Waltz

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Notes toward a rewrite:

The current plot summary is both inadequate and misleading. The central figure of the movie is not Miles Clarkson, but his wife Paula; the story is how she uncovers the truth about what happened to him, and what she finally does in revenge and for other motives. Furthermore, it is simply bizarre to insist that we don't know who these various supernatural pacts are made with. The old French spells and invocations used by the bad guys specifically mention "le diable," and the references to "The Master" and so forth follow all the conventions of a deal-with-the-devil story. If there were any mystery about who the Master is, surely the title of the movie gives it away!

Of course, the mere presence of a pact with the devil doesn't necessarily imply a Faustian theme for the movie as a whole, but the big finish of the movie involves the protagonist's pact with the devil on terms that suggest the real repulsiveness of giving up one's soul. Again, it makes no sense to insist that this isn't a Faustian story at all.

As far as critical reception, it may well be true that most reviews claimed the plot was "derivative" of Rosemary's Baby. But the word "noted" makes it sound as if this critical view is correct, instead of stupid and lazy. The novel and movie most likely were intended to draw the audience that had enjoyed Rosemary's Baby, and both movies do deal with a young woman whose weak husband draws her into troubles with Satanists, but that is all the similarity there is: even on that one-sentence abstract level, the plot is different (Rosemary's satanists win, Mephisto's lose), and the complex story-lines have hardly any other element in common. 209.181.57.144 (talk) 05:38, 13 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Fully agreed on that line about the critical reception. The fact that there's still not even one citation for that statement makes me suspect that it is simply the opinion of a single anonymous Wikipedia editor. I'm going to remove it.--Martin IIIa (talk) 14:14, 20 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Critical evaluations should stand on their own, but the idea that Mephisto Waltz is not similar to Rosemary's Baby is not defensible as neutral. Both deal with a young couple befriended by creepy people whom the wife starts to dislike while the husband gets closer to them. The wife's husband turns out not to be the man she thought he was. And in both, the female protagonist joins the Satanists in the end. That's not plagiarism, but it's not "stupid and lazy" to note obvious similarities that are not shared with very many other films. --Tysto (talk) 21:46, 28 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]