I find it very romantic and very happy! When I was a kid, I first watched "The Sound of Music" on a VCD that my grandfather bought for me (revealing my age). I was mesmerized by the songs and scenery in the movie, and I bought the tape and learned my first English song, Snowdrops (Edelweiss), which was translated into Chinese as High Mountain Velvet Grass.
This movie shaped my concept of Europe. If I had been asked what the European landscape looked like, I would have answered, "The Sound of Music". If I had been asked what the landscape of Europe looked like, I would have answered, "The Sound of Music". What did the people look like? Like in The Sound of Music. What are the buildings like? The Sound of Music.
Of course, I later learned from my reading that Europe is a complex concept, and that Austria is only one kind of Europe. There are different cultural beliefs, architectural styles and lifestyles of people in different European countries. Later read Roman history, Germanic history, Prussian, Austro-Hungarian history, World War I and World War II history, European religious history, found that Prussia, Austria-Hungary also does carry the world's imagination of the fairy tale
. Because Prussia, Austria-Hungary's princes and nobles are too much, all abound in princesses, princes, castles, idyllic, knights and so on. At the same time, because Austria-Hungary is located in the center of Europe, it is a place of strife, naturally producing countless grudges and feuds. It just makes sense that The Sound of Music would take place in Austria. Meanwhile in 2015, both writing about The Sound of Music and Austria is a very meaningful thing to do. That's because it's the 50th anniversary of the release of The Sound of Music movie, as well as the 210th anniversary of the Battle of Austerlitz. It was this battle that led to the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire, which had lasted for nearly 900 years and represented the glory days of Austria.
So this article takes a look at what Austria was really like when The Sound of Music took place? In The Sound of Music, 2/3 of the movie is about Maria, a tutor, and Captain Von Trapp and his seven children. The second 1/3 is about how the family flees Austria after it is taken over by the Nazis. Historically, this period would have been around March 1938 between the two wars. At the beginning of the movie there are subtitles introducing the setting: the last Golden Days of the Thirties. In fact, this golden period is only compared to the tragic fate of Austria, which was taken over by Germany. It was far from "golden" when compared to the pre-WWI Austro-Hungarian Empire.