The earliest of Ophuls' films to be stamped with his unmistakable signature, this tender love story between a young officer and a violinist’s daughter in turn-of-the-century Vienna establishes the director’s recurring theme of the choice between love and desire on the one hand and duty and discipline on the other. An adaptation of Arthur Schnitzler’s play, Liebelei’s fable of thwarted love features several important early examples of the director's magically gliding mobile camera.