While it is true that Austrian cinema was officially born in 1908 (with the film Von Stufe zu Stufe by Henz Hanus), a film like Die Zirkusgräfin – directed by writer, librettist and actor Felix Dörmann in 1912 – can be considered one of the first, worthwhile works of the aforementioned cinema.
The Angel with the Trumpet, the successful feature film by Karl Hartl from 1948 and freely adapted from the novel The Vienna Melody, written by Ernst Lothar in 1946, is a family saga and faithful portrait of around sixty years of Austrian history, which successfully mixes the two different points of view – that of Hartl himself, as well as the point of view from the original novel.