According to IMDB, there are no less than twenty print biographies of the actress Romy Schneider, sixteen of which are in German, four in French, and zero in English. At this point Schneider is barely known in America, though her beauty used to be world-renowned. Alain Delon, one of French cinema's greatest male beauties, had a long running on- and off-screen affair with Schneider, and in 2009 he told the French newspaper Le Provence that Romy was the love of his life. Schneider's movie stardom arced across three distinct periods: teenaged German ingenue turned overnight national icon; all-purpose Euro superstar on jet-setting international co-productions; and, finally, worldly grand dame of French cinema, her hair pulled severely back from her face. Yet even or especially at the end of her career, Schneider remained a kind of living toy, a fetish doll that directors, costume designers and makeup artists delighted in dressing up and re-painting. And thus it seems apropos that Schneider is perhaps most recognizable today not for a particular role or performance but for posing in test footage for a film that was never actually finished.
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