German actress Diane Kruger has worked in American, French, and German films and frequently plays historical leading ladies, including Helen of Troy and Marie-Antoinette. She’ll be playing “Rosemonde” in the upcoming Dangerous Liaisons prequel, Merteuil — I think that will be the younger version of the elderly Madame de Rosemonde (Mildred Natwick in the good adaptation), who hosts all the characters at her country house and thus advances the plot, in Dangerous Liaisons. So I thought it would be a good time to look back at her frock flick career!
Helen in Troy (2004)
She played the most beautiful woman in the (ancient Greek) world, whose kidnapping kicks off the Trojan War, in this loose adaptation of Homer’s Iliad.
Anna Sörensen in Joyeux Noel (2005)
A film based on the real-life “Christmas Truce” during World War I, in which armies along the Western Front called an unofficial truce over Christmas in 1914.
La princesse Constance Radetsky – la femme anarchiste d’un prince russe in The Tiger Brigades (2006)
A French film about a real-life anti-crime squad that operated in Paris in 1912.
Anna Holtz in Copying Beethoven (2006)
A fictionalized take on composer Beethoven’s final years. Holtz appears to be a fictional character.
Gloria Gregory in Goodbye Bafana (2007)
The relationship between Nelson Mandela and his censor officer/prison guard. Kruger’s character appears to be fictionalized.
Bridget von Hammersmark in Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Quentin Tarantino’s alternate-history, Jews fighting back in World War II, film. Hammersmark is a German film star turned spy for the Brits.
Marie Antoinette in Farewell, My Queen (2012)
The breakdown of the Versailles system over the first few days of the French Revolution, as seen through the eyes of Marie-Antoinette’s fictional reader (i.e., the servant who reads out loud to her).
Sarah Lincoln in The Better Angels (2014)
A biopic about Abraham Lincoln’s early years. Sarah was Abraham’s step-mother.
Clare Cavendish in Marlowe (2022)
A neo-noir crime film using Raymond Chandler’s fictional character, private detective Philip Marlowe, set in 1939. Cavendish is a glamorous heiress whose lover is missing.
Noëlle Guillaumet in Saint-Exupéry (2024)
The backstory on the author of The Little Prince, who tries to rescue his missing pilot friend in 1930. Kruger plays the friend’s wife.
Rosemonde in Merteuil (in production)
A Dangerous Liaisons prequel following the rise to power of the young Isabelle de Merteuil (Anamaria Vartolomei). Again, Kruger will be playing “Rosemonde,” who I think will be the younger version of Madame de Rosemonde, Valmont’s aunt.
Which is your favorite of Diane Kruger’s historical roles?
homer does refer to helen as fair haired, so blonde is a pretty safe interpretation tbh
Since Helen is (at least in the mythology) supposed to be half-divine (being born from Zeus “seducing” her mother disguised as a swan), it’s not unreasonable for her to have an unusual hair colour. In a visual adaptation, it also makes a certain amount of sense for her hair colour to set her apart from the other women.
In antiquity, northern Greeks were described as blond/fair while southern Greeks were dark — scholars think that somewhere in the way back, a group migrated down from the north.
Not only Homer: Sappho and Euripides also describe Helen specifically as ‘xanthe’, which means ‘golden’.
Not only Homer. Both Sappho and Euripides describe her as ‘xanthe’, which means ‘golden”.
Diane is my ulitmate girl crush, has been since National Treasure.
I’ve seen several versions of Homers Illiad, and much like with Rosamund Pike as Jane Bennett in that awful P&P movie, my first impression of Diane Kruger was; “finally! Someone stunning enough that it makes sense that she launched a thousand ships”. And then I felt bad, because the other actresses that have played Helen have also been pretty, but Diane is an absolute stunner in my opinion.
Ah la Kruger – the woman ages like fine wine and she was golden to start with.
As for Fair Helen, remember that the Greeks got around quite a bit and that they’re from the Northern Mediterranean: plenty of possibilities for an occasional blonde to crop up in the population, even without a deity in the woodpile.