A Life in Film

Fans of Hildegard Knef have always known that the star's life had all the ingredients for a good movie. Her career -- which saw her try her hand at acting, singing and writing -- spanned decades and continents, and encompassed both success and scandal.

But the film, which will begin shooting in Germany in the spring of this year and which is entitled simply "The Knef," is to focus exclusively on the years between 1947 and 1953, when Knef left the chaos of postwar Berlin on a disappointing quest for stardom in Hollywood.

At a time when Germans were not particularly welcome in the United States, Knef pursued her film breakthrough in vain, never achieving the level of fame attained by fellow German star Marlene Dietrich, to whom Knef is often compared.

Instead, she became one of hundreds of young women chasing movie roles in Hollywood, eventually landing a supporting role in "The Snows of Kilimanjaro," an adaptation of the Ernest Hemingway story that starred Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner. Knef was more successful on Broadway, where she landed the role of Ninotchka in the Cole Porter musical "Silk Stockings."

She reportedly turned down a Hollywood studio contract after being told she would have to change her name and say she was Austrian, not German.

Nude scene provoked scandal

In Europe, Knef was more of a household name, appearing in more than 50 films. She became a star for her role as a former concentration camp inmate who returns home in Wolfgang Staudte's 1946 production "Murderers Are Among Us."

But it was her role as a prostitute in the 1951 Willi Forst movie "The Sinner" that threw the actress headlong into controversy when her brief nude scene enraged the Catholic Church and sparked one of the biggest scandals in German filmmaking history.

Knef launched her singing career in the 1960s, selling out concerts in Austria, Switzerland and Germany. Her autobiography, published in 1970, was a bestseller, and she also enjoyed moderate success with a second book documenting her battle with breast cancer. Knef died in Berlin in 2002, aged 76.

Makatsch to star

In the film about her life, she will be played by German actress Heike Makatsch, who was recently awarded a German film prize for her lead role performance in another biographical picture about Margarete Steiff, the wheelchair-bound founder of a famous German teddy bear manufacturing company.

Knef's third and final husband, Paul von Scheel, said he's happy with the decision to cast Makatsch as his glamorous wife.

"She is a tremendously talented, multi-faceted actress who will also be singing in the film," he said.

Makatsch, who many say bears a striking resemblance to Knef, should also be able to relate to her character since she -- despite flirting with Hollywood success -- remains a much bigger name in the German-speaking world.