Review - The Burning Soil

August 6, 2020

The Burning Soil – Germany, 1922

There are many ways to categorize films from the silent period; perhaps one of the most interesting of which has to do with the use of the camera. For much of film’s first two decades, the camera was stationary, sitting atop a tripod, its gaze fixed on a rectangular section of a room or outdoor area. This had to be incredibly limiting to early directors, and I suspect that it was part of the reason that directing received so little respect from early studio heads; after all, the thought likely went, anyone can set a camera in position and yell action. Hollywood legend has it that D.W. Griffith was offered his first directing opportunity simply because he it was felt that he wasn’t photogenic enough to be in front of the camera; he understood the implication and is said to have interpreted the offer as an affront.

F.W. Murnau is often credited with releasing the camera from its sedentary position. While this is not entirely accurate, there is denying the impact of his 1924 film The Last Laugh – after it, there was simply no going back. He followed it up with a series of films that were both visually and narratively fascinating: Tartuffe, Faust, Sunrise, 4 Devils, City Girl, and Tabu: A Story of the South Seas. Along with his earlier masterpiece, Nosferatu,, these are the films that Murnau is primarily known for today.

In 1922, he made four films, an output unheard of today. The most famous of these remains Nosferatu. One, Marizza, called the Smuggler Madonna is mostly lost, and Phantom didn’t work for me all that well. That brings me to The Burning Soil, Murnau’s tale of unrestrained ambition and the destruction that can be left in its wake.

The film begins with the following short description, the disaster of an ambitious man in six acts, and for some time, we are unsure which man is being referred to. We meet Mr. Josef Emmanuel (Eduard von Winterstein), who is seemingly obsessed with a piece of land that he owns called Devil’s Field, a moniker it received due to the superstition that land that cannot bear fruit is cursed; rumor has it that a treasure is buried there. We also meet a young man named Johannes Rog (Vladimir Gajdarov), who, as the picture opens, is frantically trying to get back to his childhood home before his father passes away. Then there’s Peter (played impressively by Eugen Klopfer), Johannes’s down-to-earth brother, as well as Ludwig von Lellewel (Alfred Abel), Johannes’s best friend and the suitor of Emmanuel’s feisty young daughter, Gerda (Lya De Putti). For a while, each of these men has a reason to put his ambition above all else, and had the film not specified a gender, Gerda herself would be a candidate as well.

Johannes arrives too late to bid farewell to his father, but with his last words, he expresses hope that Johannes will return to the farm and marry a young woman named Marie. It doesn’t happen. Instead, Johannes, loathe to do farm work, finds employment as Mr. Emmanuel’s secretary. One day he happens to hear him say that Devil’s Field may have vast oil reserves, and as you know, such news is music to an overly ambitious man’s ears. There are a few directions the story can take at this point, some fairly predictable, but Murnau has the good sense to take the road less traveled, and the latter half of the film ismuch stronger as a result.

Still, had Murnau made The Burning Soil post The Last Laugh, it would likely be a much more involving film. In a few scenes, Murnau films characters descending into a hole in the ground. A later film would likely cut to a shot of what the man is doing in the hole, but here the camera stays where it is, while nothing happens on screen. The man re-emerges about thirty seconds later, panting and exhausted. What he was doing remains a mystery for some time, and when the revelation comes, it stretches credibility that it wouldn’t have taken much longer. In another scene, we watch as a fire rages out of control. However, the camera remains in place far from the threat, minimizing both the mayhem and the tension the scene is intended to convey.

The film has plenty to recommend it for, though. I quite enjoyed the dynamics of Johannes’s relationship with Peter, for even though they don’t have a lot of screen time together, their differences ring loud and clear. I also felt the film created three well thought out female characters, each with a distinct personality despite having the same misguided faith in the same man. And Murnau does an excellent job of building tension. We can see a train wreck coming, and I, for one, cared enough for the characters to wish I could prevent it. Sure, the ending is far too contrived and there are a few holes in logic that are never patched up, but Murnau and his talented cast make up for that with their solid and moving performances. I just wish the film were in better condition. Of Murnau’s twenty-one films, only twelve exist today, so while I understand the financial considerations that went into deciding not to restore the film, I hope someone reconsiders that decision. Murnau was a global treasure, and we should take better care of those. (on DVD)

3 stars

Review - Tartuffe

March 20, 2020

Tartuffe – Germany, 1925

Seldom do I question a director’s decision to make a movie. During the studio system, directors had very little choice in the matter, and I prefer to give directors who made films after its collapse the benefit of the doubt since what we see on the screen does not always match what a director envisioned or intended. However, while I was watching F.W. Murnau’s 1925 film Tartuffe, that question kept resurfacing.

The film is based on the play Tartuffe, first performed in 1664, 65 years after the first staging of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and written by 17^th century playwright, actor and poet Moliere. I mention Hamlet because even if you’ve never heard of Tartuffe, you’re likely familiar with Shakespeare’s drama, and therefore, very little that happens throughout the film’s 63-minute running time is likely to come as a surprise. True, the same can be said of other films adapted from novels, but the plots of these films are not so well known that even people who haven’t read them know their beginning, middle, and end.

To test this notion, let me explain the set-up of Murnau’s Tartuffe: A manipulative housekeeper (well-played by Rosa Valetti) has convinced her elderly employer (Hermann Picha) that his grandson (Andre Mattoni), an actor and supposed playboy, leads such a sinful life that he should be punished for his wickedness. Soon, we watch him write a legal note making her the sole heir to his fortune. The grandson gets wise to the plot, dons a clever disguise, and shows a film to both the schemer and the schemed. Any guess what the point of the film will be?

I should mention here that what I have just described is not in Moliere’s Tartuffe. His play focuses on the impact that a supposedly pious man named Tartuffe has on the family of a man named Orgon, and it has a number of fascinating twists and turns. Unfortunately, most of them have been removed in an attempt to produce a concise and uncomplicated cautionary tale. Gone is Orgon’s mother, who also falls under Tartuffe’s spell; also removed are Orgon’s children, an odd choice given that his daughter’s forced engagement to Tartuffe provides Orgon’s wife with a powerful motivation for wanting to expose him for the fraud he is. In Murnau’s version, there’s just Tartuffe, Orgon, his wife, Elmire, and Dorin, one of their housekeepers.

The result of this is that Tartuffe becomes a brief, overly simplified cautionary tale told not to detail the tragedy that can befall people who trust far too easily, but to send the message I know what you’re up to, a message that Murnau apparently doesn’t think has adequately been delivered, given how quickly the grandson reveals himself and announces his suspicions to his grandfather. This robs Moliere’s tale of much of its power, and while I’m not a fan of making changes to films when the director is no longer around to approve them, I could understand if someone decided to remove the film’s bookends and re-release it as a short.

The film was released a year after Murnau’s groundbreaking The Last Laugh. That was the film in which Murnau freed the camera from its stationary tripod, enabling him to use it in new, innovative ways, one of which was to put in on an elevator and film while it moved. As a result, the camera came alive. Murnau’s work here is equally impressive. Watch the way the camera follows Tartuffe as he leaves his room and descends the stairs, his eyes fixed on the Bible in front of them. It is hypnotic. In another scene, he focuses his lens on a picture of Orgon, as his wife struggles to accept the passive, dutiful subject that her husband has become. Suddenly, a tear falls on it, then another. We soon see the woman press her lips against the picture and weep. It is an incredible moment, and Murnau’s camera makes it immensely personal.

I’m not sure Emil Jannings ever gets Tartuffe, playing him more like a depraved Igor-figure rather than someone who could believably attract followers with his religious messages. Only when he reveals his true nature does Jannings begin to play him as a flesh-and-blood character. Werner Krauss fairs better as Orgon, as does Lil Dagover as Elmire, and I admire the way Murnau’s camera enables us to see the world through Tartuffe’s lecherous eyes. We see exactly what he is lusting for, and it made me a bit worried about Elmire’s safety.    

Still, I could never shake the awareness that none of what I was watching really mattered. It was a play performed by an actor, a story told to shake a character of her sense of invulnerability. Eventually Tartuffe would again become something that Tartuffe the play was never intended to be, and I dreaded that. Now I can’t help lamenting what could have been. Murnau was a master storyteller; he fashioned images so powerful that they have become a permanent part of our cinematic memories. Tartuffe has its fair share of such scenes, yet they are diminished by the narrative they are used to support. Tartuffe could easily have been a masterpiece. In its present form, however, it is just a minor beauty - watchable, yet entirely forgettable, an example of what happens when a director and screenwriter don’t trust their source material. It’s a pity, really. Just read Tartuffe. It didn’t need any changes. (on DVD; on Blu-ray in April 28, 2020)

2 and a half stars

*Tartuffe is a silent film.

Review - The Last Laugh

March 12, 2020

The Last Laugh – Germany, 1924

I am roughly halfway through Stephen Michael Shearer’s fascinating biography Gloria Swanson: The Ultimate Star, and one thing that keeps coming up is the legendary actress’s wardrobe. Swanson apparently believed that moviegoers expected their stars to look the part, and therefore, she spent lavishly on clothing, for both her films and private use. She was a star at a time when the general public, according to Mr. Shearer, was obsessed with wealth and how the wealthy lived. Reviews of Swanson’s films usually included descriptive, laudatory comments on her attire, which could change fourteen times in one film, and she was seen – by herself above all - as a fashion trendsetter. I have reviewed five of her films, and I have yet to comment on what she wears in any of my reviews; it just doesn’t register.

What exactly does Mrs. Swanson’s wardrobe have to do with F.W. Murnau's The Last Laugh, a film made in 1924 on the other side of the world? Well, knowing how important it was to dress as if you were a success may help you better empathize with the characters at the heart of Murnau’s tale. In the film, German superstar Emil Jannings, the recipient of the inaugural award for Best Actor in 1927, plays an aging doorman at a high-class hotel called The Atlantic, and he loves his uniform, so much so that he walks to and from work in it. He receives looks of admiration, and his neighbors have a habit of giving him the kind of send-off usually reserved for a military general or Hollywood celebrity. His wife adores him, in the evening, his daughter scans the entrance to their neighborhood for hints of his arrival, and the children in his neighborhood look at him with a mix of pride and envy. They all wish they could wear swanky apparel.

Early in the film, we watch him hold court on a rainy, blustery day at work. At one point, he has to carry a large suitcase into the hotel, and the task takes a physical toll of him. Heavily winded, he sits down in the lobby, has a glass of water, and attempts to get his breathing back under control. Soon however he pops back up and resumes his duties with real vim and vigor. Alas, it is too late for him to escape the judgmental eyes of the hotel manager, who sees the doorman’s temporary respite as a sign that is time to put him out to pasture. The next day he arrives at work to find that he’s been replaced.

It is here that The Last Laugh becomes divisive, veering off in a narrative direction that modern audience may not be able – or willing – to follow, and it all has to do with the doorman’s clothes. If it is true that the clothes make the man, then it can reasonably be said that clothes can emasculate a man, and this is what happens to the unfortunate doorman. However, his reaction is not the problem, for while Jannings overdoes it by making depression look too much like dementia, we get why he would struggle accepting the winds of change and his sudden lower stature – it’s the reactions of his friends and family that confound and infuriate. Suffice to say, they don’t take his demotion very well.

Yes, you read that right - demotion, not termination. You could understand a family’s sudden onset of anxieties as they ponder the reality of unemployment in a section of the world still reeling from the aftermath of World War I. You can understand neighbors seeing the downfall of one of their own as a worrying sign, especially as many of the one’s we see are the same age as the doorman. We can also empathize with a young daughter whose new life with her husband begins just as her ageing parents experience financial insecurity. What I don’t think we can understand is mocking someone who has lost his position in a company or of being so ashamed of a family member in such circumstances that they seek refuge in someone else’s home. In one scene, the doorman’s daughter’s head collapses onto her husband’s shoulder, while his wife looks at him with a look of shame and disdain. Why?

I suspect that audiences in the 1920’s didn’t ask this question. They understood the times and sentiments reflected in the film, and they likely sympathized with the doorman’s family. However, just as current sentiments make Harold Lloyd’s The Freshman hard for modern moviegoers to relate to, they also make the reaction to the doorman’s plight simply indefensible. As a result, the film becomes an unintended indictment on the pettiness of the lower class. They are presented as vile, opportunistic, and absolutely eager to kick a man when he is down. It isn’t enough to have a job and provide for your family; you have to have the position and clothes to match. Nothing else matters.

Yet it does. Millions of people have jobs that do not offer the same level of prestige as being a lawyer or doctor. Their jobs are a means of survival, not the fulfillment of a lifelong dream, and there’s nothing wrong with having them. So, when the doorman looks lost and physically defeated, I wasn’t struck by the tragedy of the moment; instead, it seemed like a bit of an overreaction, of an unexpected jolt that he’d get over in time. And when his family reacted to him as if he’d suddenly come down with the plague or disgraced them irredeemably, my thought was how petty, not how awful for them. In fact, by the end of the film, the only character I truly admired was the hotel’s night watchman, for he’s the only one to show true sympathy to his down-and-out co-worker. And then there’s the film’s disastrous ending, a happy ending that dilutes the film of its power and which the film’s intertitles apologize for in advance. It’s as if Murnau is saying, “Sorry about this. The studio heads made me do it.”

The Last Laugh has a strong set-up, and it is always watchable. Also, like all of Murnau’s films, it is incredibly well directed. I particularly admired how Murnau films scenes from outside windows and how he lingers on the quietness of a neighborhood at the end of a long evening. I was also moved by his depiction of the doorman’s two neighborhoods – the bustling, well-lit, buoyant atmosphere of the hotel and the darker, less chiseled look of the apartment complex where he lives. In one scene, Murnau films the doorman as he notices his wife working hard in the mirror as he is shaving, and in another Murnau fixes the camera on the doorman’s removed jacket as if hangs in a closet, presumably never to be worn by him again. The man was truly a visionary. It isn’t his fault that the film may not resonate like it once did. In fact, it’s probably a good thing. It shows we’ve progressed. Sure, clothes still make the man, but not having the clothes is no longer an indignity. It’s just part of life. (on DVD and Blu-ray)

3 stars

*The Last Laugh is a silent film.

**Since writing this, I've learned of the importance of uniforms in Germany in the years leading up to the Second World War. This makes sense, and what happens in the film certainly bears this out. It doesn't, however, erase my dubiousness concerning the extreme reactions that the family and the neighbors have.

Review - The Haunted Castle

August 8, 2019

The Haunted Castle – Germany, 1921

F.W. Murnau’s misleadingly titled The Haunted Castle has to be the longest 81 minutes I’ve ever spent watching a movie. With its glacial pacing and long stretches devoted to reaction shots whose only function is to demonstrate how much pain a character is in, the film was a good reminder that even the greatest of filmmakers can only do so much with a substandard screenplay. And I give Murnau credit for trying. From the lighting on the castle that makes it seem both cursed at night and a place of radiance in the day to the intriguing diversity in social atmosphere and physical space, the film has the look of both a classic horror film and an expressionistic Gothic painting. If only it had a plot.

That last sentence is a bit of an exaggeration, for the film indeed does have a narrative that drives it. The problem is what little story there is could be more succinctly told in a 35-45 minute short. Extended an additional 30 minutes, the story lingers far too long of inconsequential moments. For example, characters stare into the camera for what seems like an eternity instead of just answering basic questions; a priest takes far too long entering a room; and an outdoor scene of a coach arriving has a tediousness to it – we see the empty road, then the coach in the distance, the coach closer up, the coach passing the camera, the coach coming to a halt. And after all that, we don’t even get to see who gets out. Instead, we cut the the castle and see the butler rush in and announce someone’s arrival, thereby making the scene entirely superfluous.

Here is the plot in a nutshell, and no, it does not involve an actual haunted house or the ghost-like figure that graces the poster and DVD cover. A rich man (Lothan Mehnert) assumed to have killed his brother for money shows up unexpected at the home of a wealthy upperclassman (Arnold Korff) who’s hosting a fox hunt for a number of guests. One of the guests is the widow of the slain brother (Olga Tschechowa), clearly setting up a confrontation. Also on his way is a priest whom the widow considers a confidant. The impression given is that the presence of this trio will set sparks flying and possibly lead to murder. As the pieces of this mystery are being assembled, we, the audience, wait, and we wait, enduring conversations in which characters speak in code so as not to reveal anything too soon. Thus, what could be a crisp, compelling tale of revenge and murder becomes an exercise in clock-watching. Murnau and his producers must have wanted the film to be long enough to quality as a feature film; audiences are more likely to just want it to be over.

Watching it, I was reminded of all of the jokes about silent acting on account of its supposed repetitive emotional looks and exaggerated physical movements. For the most part, I have found such attributes to be the exception, not the rule. Here, however, we get them in abundance, often from the same character. The widow, for example, is rarely seen with an expression that could be called naturalistic, and the camera dwells so often of the mysterious, angst-ridden face of the stranger that you half expect him to be revealed as a creature of the night hell-bent on avenging a fellow creature staked through the heart in a previous movie. And then there’s the unwelcome presence of comic characters, whose only purpose seems to be to disrupt the eerie seriousness of the situation that the other characters are trying so desperately to create.

When it was finally time for the mystery to be resolved, I no longer cared. For all its time spent on depressed or rage-filled looks, there is very little that engages the audience or makes them sympathetic to its lead characters. The stranger is bully, the widow keeps the audience at a distance by acting like a mute, and the priest just hangs out in the shadows. In fact, the only character who elicited any empathy from me was the owner of the castle. After all, all he wants is to have a good time hunting foxes with his friends. Instead, he gets a gloomy, rain-filled weekend in which time seems to be punishing him. It certainly felt like it was punishing me. (on DVD and Blu-ray from Kino)

2 stars

Review - Phantom (1922)

July 13, 2019

Phantom – Germany, 1922

Picture a man getting knocked over by an out-of-control carriage. At first, he appears to be unconscious – possibly even worse. A moment later, he comes to, and, in his rattled and likely concussed state, he stares at the beautiful young driver of the coach as she repeatedly inquires as to his well-being. Now, picture this man, his gaze frozen on the young woman who appears to be encircled in angelic white light, a contrast with the darker colors of the clothes and city surrounding him. The man rises, slightly stumbles forward, a look of confusion in his eyes. The young lady, seeing that he appears to be physically unharmed, gets back in her coach and rides off. Abruptly, the man takes off after the coach, his demeanor akin to that of a man possessed. Now, what would be your assessment of the man’s condition?

If I were a betting man, I say that most people would assume that he had some sort of brain trauma – a severe concussion, perhaps. After all, to ignore your physical well-being and chase after a woman you’ve only seen once is hardly the action of a man with all of his faculties functioning as they should. This impression would be strengthened by what comes next – a frantic, obsessive pursuit of a stranger that involves pleading with her extremely discomforted mother not to engage her to another man until he’s had a chance to pursue her. The woman wisely whispers for a servant to get her husband at once.

The character in question is Lorenz Lubota, a poor government desk clerk whose love of reading often takes precedence over his empty stomach. An interest as strong as this one usually indicates a romantic quality, yet it’s hard to see Lorenz ever being confused as a Romeo-type. His eyes avert contact, he doesn’t seem to apply himself to anything – certainly not to his job – and he seems utterly unaware that one of his neighbors has fallen head over heel for him. It’s entirely possible he’s never had a girlfriend or even been out on a date. As the film progresses, we witness Lorenz’s moral decline, as he begins to acquire both an inflated sense of self and an awareness of the importance of money if he is going to have the successful ending to his own skewed version of Romeo and Juliet.

Lorenz is played by Alfred Abel, and like many actors from the silent period he started out on the stage. By all accounts, he was rather successful there. His Wikipedia entry references his involvement in Berlin’s Deutschen Theate in 1904, nine years before he would make his first appearance on the silver screen. He would go on to play the leader of the underground city in Fritz Lang’s seminal film Metropolis. He even survived the transition to sound and appeared in 140 films during his twenty-five year film career. You don’t have that kind of longevity by chance.

Having said that, I must admit that he is wrong for the role of Lorenz Lubota. Born in 1879, Abel was over forty when he took on the part, and he looked it. In his face, we do not see the youthful naivety of a man whose emotions have suddenly overwhelmed him. Instead, there’s desperation, the look of someone who seems to be under the impression that he has only one chance at true love. His physical movements are manic, and when he isn’t making entirely inappropriate requests of complete strangers, he’s allowing delusions of grandeur to overwhelm him and cause him to entertain the notion that a perfect stranger would fall in love with him if only given the opportunity. All of this would be fine were the film to acknowledge that Lorenz’s actions have a medical explanation, yet as the film went on, it became clear that one was not coming. Where’s the doctor from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari when you need him?

The uneven nature of the lead character almost overshadows the positives in the film, and there are many worth mentioning. I particularly enjoyed the depictions of Lorenz’s mother and his well-off aunt, and their strained relationship shines a light on the suffering that is allowed to go on because of disdain that some have for those who just can’t seem to pull themselves out of poverty. I also admired the way the film depicted the contrasting values of the young in the 1920s. In the film, Lorenz’s younger brother is an art student, and he dutifully takes care of his mother. Their sister could not be more dissimilar. She spends her evenings at a freewheeling tavern where alcohol flows liberally and men gather to enjoy the flirtations of much younger women, many of whom are openly looking to hook up with someone able to provide them with a life of fun and financial security.

I also admired many of Murnau’s directorial choices, particularly his use of light and darkness. In one scene, Murnau has Lorenz run through a city than seems to bending over and which is filled with shadowy figures who seem to know about Lorenz’s moral breakdown. Murnau also gets great performances from several of the cast. Frida Richard is a wonder as Lorenz’s mother, and Aud Egede-Nissen hits all the right notes as his morally lost sister. Anton Edthofer is impressive in the role of Lorenz’s corrupter, Mr. Wigottschinski, and Grete Berger is excellent in the very challenging role of Lorenz’s aunt, Pfandleiherin Schwabe, who is both the victim of a crime and an entirely classist individual. In fact, I’d venture to say that when Lorenz is not on screen or not the character driving the drama, the film is quite impressive.

Yet Lorenz is there, and Phantom is ultimately his story. Perhaps in another decade, the character would have been a World War I veteran dealing with PTSD or a doctor would diagnose his erratic behavior as being the result of the carriage accident. And characters would talk about this and declare their concern for his mental stability. This would make his character much more sympathetic, and we would see his decline as not moral failure but a tragic symptom of a much larger problem. We would also get a hint of the means by which he recovers his senses. Sadly, that is not this film. Still, I can’t say I disliked the film entirely, yet when a character begins a movie by declaring that what we’re going to see is both a confession and a release, his explanation should satisfy the viewer and make us empathize with the storyteller. This doesn’t happen in Phantom, and the fault is a performance that is at cross purposes with a narrative. (on DVD from Flicker Alley)

2 and a half stars

*Phantom is a silent film.      

Review - The Finances of the Grand Duke

November 29, 2018

The Finances of the Grand Duke – Germany, 1924

A curious thing occurs towards the end of F.W. Murnau’s The Finances of the Grand Duke: A woman looks at the film’s main character and asks, “Is that the Grand Duke?” Now, out of context, such a remark would raise no eyebrows whatsoever. However, the character who utters it is a Russian princess named Olga who has already indicated that she is willing both to marry him and to pay off the massive debt that he has accrued after years apparently spent living lavishly and foolhardily. This is, of course, not a new situation to silent films – Keaton and Chaplin practically made a career out of marrying someone in the last scene, and often, it was to someone they had just met 15 minutes earlier. However, in Murnau’s film, it is an odd choice, and not even Olga’s impassioned exclamation that she was moved by the way his island came to the aid of a sinking Russian ship – presumably during the First World War – completely erases the awkwardness of the situation. In my view, the Grand Duke’s assistance would be cause for an award or banquet in his honor, not the hand and instant affections of a princess.

But I digress slightly. The Finances of the Grand Duke is part comedy, part espionage thriller, with not enough of either to qualify as laugh-out-loud funny or thoroughly intriguing. This does not make it a terrible film by any stretch of the imagination, yet it does knock it down a few notches. The film begins, oddly enough, as a comedy. In its opening scene, we watch as the Grand Duke (Harry Liedtke) sits on the stone wall of his island palace and tosses money in the general direction of some young boys in the water below him. I initially assumed the scene was establishing the Grand Duke as a disrespectful spoiled brat, the kind that treats his subjects as if they were circus performers anxiously waiting for their next mouthful of peanuts. This interpretation is justified in the next scene, in which the Grand Duke is informed that the island’s benefactor has arrived wanting his money back. The Grand Duke’s posture quickly resembles that of a child who been told to go to bed before he’s ready, his arms folded, his feet pacing in that frustrated way that only an adult with the mentality of a five-year-old employs.

Upon seeing that, I settled in for an uproarious look at an immature ruling class and the hilarity that ensues when the Grand Duke finds himself unable to pay back the money he borrowed. How surprised I was then when the film suddenly adopted a much more serious tone, taking on issues such as the exploitation of both workers and the environment and detailing the perilous position that powerful people can find themselves in if they don’t recognize the tell-tale signs of danger. In the film, a mysterious stranger dangles millions of dollars in front of the Duke, his only request that the island’s sulfur deposits be placed under his control. The Grand Duke, imagining the waste that extraction would cause to both the environment and the island’s citizens on account of their laboring for so long in unhealthy conditions, turns the man down. The man, somewhat predictably, elects not to take no for an answer, and away we go.

The Duke comes across as a genuinely nice guy, yet it should be noted that the film never shows him being a dictator or provides examples of his supposed benevolence. He smiles quite a lot and seems to put an awful lot of faith in fate. In fact, his comments about what is needed to save his island have an uncanny knack for occurring shortly after he voices them. He is the heart of the film, yet not its most interesting character. That distinction falls to Professor Philipp Collins, well-played by Alfred Abel. Collins is one of those well-to-do professors we so often find in movies of this time, meaning he appears wealthier than any professor any of us have likely ever met. Collins, however, also has other distinguishing characteristics. For one, he has the skills of a petty thief, yet the conscious of Robin Hood. In one scene, we see him sneak into the office of a professional blackmailer and remove several embarrassing documents. Collin is also a gentleman with a grand understanding of irony and timing, and his scenes with Olga (Mady Christians) are some of the best in the film. However, the character never quite felt realistic.

The film is split into acts, and each scroll uses wit to introduce the characters that appear soon after. It is a tone that is not always matched by what follows. I found myself mildly amused by what transpired in the film, yet never completely engaged emotionally. Towards the end of the film, the pace quickens a bit, yet even here it fails to present us with a logical scenario. We’re asked to believe that an island nation run by a dictator has no defenses or army and that its government could be toppled by just four individuals. We’re also asked to imagine the island’s residents and to accept their adoration for the Duke, for Murnau has elected not to include a single crowd shot of the island’s inhabitants. In fact, if memory serves, we only really see three of them throughout the entire film.

The Finances of the Grand Duke is a break from the dark films that Murnau was most known for. It is a simple story told with simple techniques. While lacking the emotional punch of his other work, the film indeed gives viewers a good sense of his range as a director. As for the film itself, it is a minor work, one that will provide viewers a few chuckles and then be forgotten a few minutes later. (on DVD from Kino)

2 and a half stars

*The Finances of the Grand Duke is a silent film.