The son of Emperor Franz Josef of Austria, Crown Prince Rudolf, is believed to have shot at his female lover and himself at a suicide pact at 1882 at Mayerling. Because of Imperial cover-ups, the complete story might not be well known. This story was filmed a few days, in French 1935 and in English in 1968. Director Miklos Jancso re-creates those events because of their own purposes, continuing his preferred subject of paternal authority's rejection. At Rudolf can be just a GoldenBoy, who cavorts with a multitude of amazing, aristocratic fans and friends of both sexes. He will not leave his country idyll although he has been ordered to by the Emperor, his father. Despite the fact that for a huge region of the film, attractive folks participating in sexual encounters and go about unclothed, the mood is one of melancholy in the place of prurience.