Director: Fritz Lang
Screenplay: Fritz Lang and Thea von Harbou
Starring: Lil Dagover, Walter Janssen, Bernhard Goetzke, Rudolf Klein-Rogge
Genre: Fantasy, romance
Running Time: 99 minutes
In this silent German film, a young couple (Dagover and Janssen) on a journey encounter the personification of Death (Goetzke), who takes the life of the man. Heartbroken, the woman finds her way into Death's realm to plead for the life of her beloved. Touched by her plight, Death presents her with three tales of love and death: One set in an ancient Middle Eastern city, the other in Renaissance-era Venice and the third in ancient China. If the woman can change the tragic outcome of just one of the episodes, Death will release her lover.
This is an early and unjustly neglected film from acclaimed director Fritz Lang. The film's original German title translates as The Weary Death: A German Folk Song in Six Verses, and it is like a folk story, with a dream-like, expressionist look and, for the time, innovative special effects. The three love stories all have a distinctive flavour to them, they all have a unique look beyond the lavish costumes and production design. Looked at today, the fact that the characters are all played by white people in heavy make-up is problematic, albeit standard for the time. The story was inspired by Indian mythology. The film depicts Death as a gaunt, pale man in a wide-brimmed hat, a strangely sympathetic character who is tired of his endless task, and being cursed and despised by the living (Lang claimed that his concept of Death came from a fever-dream he had as a child). None of the other characters are as memorable are as well-imagined as Death. Even today, the film is visually striking and endlessly imaginative, although not without it's problems. There is humour in the movie, but it takes itself seriously and invites it's audience to take it seriously and some level to believe in it's dark magic.
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