Heidi is a 1965 Austrian family film directed by Werner Jacobs and starring Eva Maria Singhammer, Michaela May and Jan Koester. It is an adaptation of Johanna Spyri's 1880 novel of the same title.
The film's sets were designed by the art directors Fritz Jüptner-Jonstorff and Hans Zehetner. It was shot in Eastmancolor.
Plot summary
The eight-year-old child, Heidi (Eva Maria Singhammer), lives with her grandfather, Alp-Oehi (Gustav Knuth), in a cottage in the Swiss Alps and enjoys spending time in the mountains with Peter, her friend the goatherd (Jan Koester), who believes that one has to choose between either living in the Alps and herding goats or learning to read.
The village parson (Rudolph Prack) calls in on Alp-Oehi. He asks him to come to the village along with Heidi to attend the installation of the new church bell. A festival is held around the installation of the bell. Traditionally, the children help hoist up the new bell, and Heidi should be part of the event. In addition, she could make friends with the children of the village, because soon she would start going to school in the village, anyway. The child should have already been enrolled in school by law. Alp-Oehi protests: Heidi cannot go to school every day in the winter while facing snow storms and the cold. The parson agrees and suggests that Alp-Oehi could return and live in the village. However, Alp-Oehi is not thrilled because he is at odds with the villagers. In the past, they accused him of being responsible for a fire which damaged many houses and the church tower. But, actually, Alp-Oehi was innocent and even lost his only son, Heidi's father, while the latter was fighting the fire. Shortly thereafter, Heidi's mother died from grief over the loss. Aunt Dete (Lotte Ledl), the sister of Heidi's mother, took initially care of the child. However, she entrusted her to the old man when she got a job in Frankfurt in Germany.
Heidi lives happily with her grandfather. She even convinces him to attend the festival so she could help the other children hoist up the new bell. At the end of the village’s festival, Brigitte (uncredited), Peter's mother, is surprised to see Alp-Oehi next to her house. Heidi’s grandfather suggests then that "someone" (implying, in a non-explicit manner, himself) could repair the two uninhabited rooms she possesses next to her house, so this "someone" could live there during the winter. Aunt Dete travels from Frankfurt to the Swiss village where she meets Alp-Oehi while he is repairing the rooms he intended to live in with Heidi during the winter. Dete is employed at the Sesemann house as a cook. Alfred Sesemann (Ernst Schröder), a wealthy businessman and a widower, is seeking a companion for his daughter Klara (Michaela May). Klara, a sick teenager, uses a wheelchair after an illness. Dete thinks Heidi could be that companion for Klara. During her brief meeting with Alp-Oehi, she asks the old man to let her take Heidi with her to Frankfurt, where the child will receive a good education and will keep Klara company. Alp-Oehi knows that this city life will not fit Heidi and rejects Dete's suggestion. Nevertheless, Dete deceives Brigitte, Alp-Oehi, a villager and Heidi. She returns to Frankfurt by train, taking the child with her. Aunt Dete makes Heidi believe she could come back to her village whenever she wanted as soon as she finds a new pipe for her grandpa. Informed by Brigitte, the Alp-Oehi tries to stop them, but it is too late.