Eyes of the Mummy (1918)

Ernst Lubitsch had been making short films in Germany for several years but Eyes of the Mummy (Die Augen der Mumie Ma) was the feature film that established him as a director to take note of. It was released in October 1918 so it was actually made during the First World War. It’s also significant in being his first movie starring Pola Negri. It gave him a taste of commercial success. Two months later he had his first major international hit, Carmen, again starring Pola Negri. Lubitsch had arrived.

It’s not that easy to classify Eyes of the Mummy. The title leads one to suspect a horror movie but the horror movie genre did not exist in 1918. At the time it would presumably have been regarded as an exotic melodrama. That’s how I’d describe it.

The next few years would see Lubitsch in wildly and intoxicatingly experimental mode. He accepted the existence of no rules. The only limits were imposed by the film-maker’s imagination and Lubitsch’s imagination at that time was boundless.

There is no actual mummy in Eyes of the Mummy but there is an ancient Egyptian tomb and there is a curse, and strange and inexplicable events have been linked to the tomb.

Two Europeans are in Egypt, separately, exploring the ruins and soaking up the exotic atmosphere. One is Prince Hohenfels (Max Laurence). The other is a painter, Albert Wendland (Harry Liedtke).

Wendland makes an amazing discovery in the tomb. There is a girl imprisoned there, and she’s very much alive. Her name is Ma (Pola Negri). That’s also the name of the Egyptian queen buried in the tomb. The girl had been kidnapped and enslaved by a scoundrel named Radu (Emil Jannings). Wendland rescues the girl and takes her back to Germany with him.

Meanwhile Prince Hohenfels has found the disconsolate Radu wandering in the desert. The Prince takes Radu back to Europe with him. This is likely to lead to trouble. Radu intends to reclaim his slave girl.

Wendland has installed Ma in his household, presumably as his mistress. They’re crazy about each other. Ma is a wild child, knowing nothing whatever of civilisation or the social rules, but she’s charming and adorable and very sexy.

Ma becomes quite a social success and gains acclaim as a dancer. A painting of her by Wendland makes her even more of a celebrity.

Unfortunately her growing celebrity also alerts Radu to the fact there she is here, in the same city. He has not given up his obsession with her. In his own perverse way he probably does truly love her.

Emil Jannings had a huge reputation as an actor in this period, something I’ve never quite understood. In this role he does certainly convey the idea of a man with a dangerous obsession.

This is however Pola Negri’s film. She was one of the great screen sex goddesses but interesting she generally did not play vamps or bad girls. Her specialty was playing wild crazy fiery passionate women. Sometimes they were a bit naughty, but in an endearing way. They were women who could drive a man crazy, but he’d enjoy it. Negri just had her own unique screen persona and it made her one of the most fascinating stars of the silent era.

The big danger here is to treat this as a horror movie, and then be disappointed that it doesn’t work as a horror movie. Lubitsch was not trying to make a horror movie. He was trying to make a romantic melodrama, and when you judge it in that light it does work. There are no overt supernatural elements but there are very subtle suggestions that influences slightly outside the range of normal experience could be at work. Ma has the same name as the long-dead Egyptian queen. Could Queen Ma be partly responsible for the hypnotic effect that the modern Ma exercises over men? Is there some vague occult connection between Ma and Radu? Perhaps.

Lubitsch was developing astonishingly quickly as a director. Within a year he would be making much more accomplished and much more ambitious movies. Eyes of the Mummy still has considerable interest as marking the beginnings of Lubitsch’s incredibly rich early German period. And Pola Negri is always worth watching. Recommended.

I’ve reviewed quite a few of these early Lubitsch films - The Oyster Princess (1919), The Doll (Die Puppe, 1919), Sumurun (1920) and the magnificent The Wildcat (1921).

The Spiders (1919-20)

The Spiders (Die Spinnen) is one of Fritz Lang’s earliest films. The original intention was to make four linked feature films. Only two were completed - The Golden Sea (Der goldene See) in 1919 and The Diamond Ship (Das Brillantenschiff) in 1920. Both were written and directed by Lang. The great Karl Freund did the cinematography on part 2.

These two movies combine action and adventure in exotic locales with romance and intrigue.

I think it’s fair to say that Lang’s movies became more complex and interesting when he started collaborating with Thea von Harbou. She added a bit more psychological depth. Having said that there are still plenty of distinctive Langian themes and Langian touches in this very early movie.

The hero of The Golden Sea is playboy sportsman Kay Hoog. He is about to compete in a major yacht race when he finds a message in a bottle. The message was written by a Harvard professor who vanished five years earlier. The message speaks of a lost civilisation and hidden treasure, and gives the geographical location in which both can be found. This appeals to Kay Hoog’s sense of adventure and sportsmanship a lot more than a yacht race. He sets off in pursuit of the treasure although it’s reasonable to assume that the adventure attracts him more than the treasure.

He discovers a lost remnant of the Inca Empire. There is plenty of gold, but also plenty of danger. The Incas still practise human sacrifice and Kay might well be the next sacrifice.

He also rescues a beautiful Inca high priestess, Naela (Lil Dagover). They fall in love. The fly in the ointment is that she’s the who will have to offer Kay as a sacrifice to the sun god.

His other problem is the Spiders, a secret and ruthless criminal society who are also after that gold. His particular problem is the leader of the Spiders, the glamorous but wicked Lio Sha (Ressel Orla). He doesn’t yet know just how dangerous a woman she is.

Kay and Naela have lot of narrow escapes. There are exciting action sequences. There are some splendid visuals. The sets and costumes are impressive.

Lil Dagover makes a fine heroine. And Lio Sha is convincingly devious.

Kay is determined to escape and to take Naela with him.

In The Diamond Ship Kay Hoog and the Spiders have some unfinished business to attend to.

At stake in this episode is a diamond in the shape of the head of Buddha. Stolen 400 years earlier it is believed to be the key to restoring Asian greatness and independence from the European great powers. Lio Sha and the Spiders want that diamond. So does Kay Hoog.

The search takes Kay into the hidden Chinese city beneath the streets of San Francisco’s Chinatown. Lio Sha has embarked on the ship Storm Bird.

There’s a kidnapping and there are exciting chases through hidden passageways, betrayals and plenty of gunplay.

The Spiders anticipates thematic elements that would appear in Lang’s slightly later movies. The sinister secret criminal organisation, the shadowy conspiracies and the hints of paranoia would be quite at home in Dr Mabuse: The Gambler (1922) and Spies (1928).

There’s a fascination with secret worlds and also with technology (which would play such a large rôle in Lang movies such as Metropolis and Woman in the Moon).

To appreciate this movie fully you need to know something of the popular culture landscape of the time. Diabolical criminal masterminds were all the rage. The first great example of the breed, Dr Nikola, had been created by Australia writer Guy Boothby in A Bid for Fortune in 1895. It was followed by a sequel, Dr Nikola Returns. By the time Lang made this movie Sax Rohmer had written his first three Dr Fu Manchu novels. In 1911 Fantômas, created by by Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre, made his first appearance in print. Louis Feuillade’s first Fantômas movie serial was released in 1913. Lang was tapping into a major pop culture obsession of the time.

The Spiders demonstrates the extraordinary technical sophistication of the German film industry in 1919 and the 29-year-old Lang’s confidence and ambition.

For many years this film was thought to be lost but a print was found in the 1970s.

The Spiders is a rather outrageous rollicking adventure romp. Highly recommend.

The Kino Classics DVD offers a reasonable transfer given the film’s age and rarity.

It’s interesting that almost at the end of his career Lang returned to Germany and made another two-part movie, known popularly as the Indian Epic, with a somewhat similar feel to The Spiders.

The Oyster Princess (1919)

The Oyster Princess (Die Austernprinze) is a very early German Ernst Lubitsch film, described as a grotesque comedy which sums it up quite well.

If you’re only familiar with Lubitsch’s Hollywood movies his German silent movies will come as a major shock. They’re wild and crazy. Lubitsch invented his own genres as he went along. These movies obey none of the rules of conventional film-making that became established with the coming of the sound, but they don’t even obey any of the rules of silent film-making. Lubitsch just didn’t care about rules at this stage of his career. He was wildly experimental. I’d be tempted to describe the young Lubitsch as an avant-garde film-maker but that gives the impression of someone taking himself very seriously and Lubitsch wasn’t taking himself seriously at all. He was making fun movies. They were crazy, but they were fun.

The Oyster Princess is the story of Ossi (Ossi Oswalda), the daughter of American millionaire tycoon Quaker (Victor Janson). Quaker made his fortune from oysters. He’s the oyster king.

Ossi is throwing an epic tantrum. She has just heard that the daughter of America’s shoe-polish king has married a count. She now expects to marry a man at least equal to a count, preferably outranking a count. To calm her down her father promises to buy her a prince.

Quaker engages the services of renowned matchmaker Seligsohn (Max Kronert). Quaker places a firm order for a prince.

Fortunately in Europe in 1919 princes could be picked up quite inexpensively. There were plenty of noblemen who had lost their estates and fortunes in wars and revolutions. All of them would jump at the chance to marry a millionaire’s daughter.

Such a nobleman is Prince Nucki (Harry Liedtke). He is a real prince but he shares a squalid tenement apartment with his buddy Josef (Julius Falkenstein). Josef is in theory the prince’s aide-de-camp, and his only servant. Prince Nucki doesn’t have two pfennigs to rub together. What he has are debts. The marriage sounds like a fine idea.

Josef is dispatched to the Quaker mansion to meet Ossi and to make arrangements for the wedding.

Josef is certainly impressed by Quaker’s wealth. His mansion isn’t the size of a small palace, it’s the size of a large palace. Ossi doesn’t have a personal maid. She has two dozen personal maids.

The wedding doesn’t turn out quite as expected. Ossi gets married, but to whom?

This is not a bedroom farce and it’s not really a bawdy comedy. It pokes fun at millionaires and princes but it’s not really a satire. It’s certainly not a realist film but it’s not a fantasy. Everything is highly exaggerated but it doesn’t feel like surrealism.

There is romance, but this film doesn’t neatly fit the romance genre either.

It’s a bit of all those things blended into an intoxicating cocktail.

There has never been an actress quite like Ossi Oswalda. She made a series of films for Lubitsch and her performances are always bizarre and over-the-top but she’s quite different in each film. She had a knack of being bizarre and loveable at the same time. A strange actress but a fascinating one.

The Oyster Princess doesn’t have the overt and deliberate extreme artificiality or the extreme stylisation of other early Lubitsch movies, but you can sense that he’s starting to move in that direction.

Mostly it’s just crazy good-natured fun. The characters might be grotesques but they’re likeable in spite of this. Even Quaker, as crass as he is, isn’t such a bad old guy.

And I haven’t even mentioned the fox-trot epidemic yet.

This movie is included in the Lubitsch in Berlin DVD boxed set from Eureka (which has now been released on Blu-Ray as well) and it’s also available on Blu-Ray from Kino Classics. My copy is from the DVD set and the transfer is quite OK and English subtitles are provided for the title cards.

It’s best to approach The Oyster Princess with no expectations at all in mind. Just sit back and enjoy the ride. Highly recommended.

The Doll (Die Puppe, 1919)

The Doll (Die Puppe) is a 1919 German silent fantasy/comedy directed and co-written by Ernst Lubitsch.

It was based on a story by the early 19th century German Romantic writer E.T.A. Hoffmann. If you haven’t read any of Hoffmann’s stories do so immediately. They’re a combination of Romantic, gothic, fantasy and weird elements and they’re exhilarating.

This is a kind of fairy tale and everything is made to look as artificial as possible - it’s like a children’s story book come to life, although it’s not really a story for children!

The Baron von Chauterelle does not want his distinguished family line to die out. His heir is his nephew Lancelot. He has decided that Lancelot must marry immediately. All the marriageable young maidens from the nearby village, forty of them in all, are instructed to present themselves at the baron’s castle so that Lancelot can pick his bride. The maidens are all desperately anxious to be chosen - marriage to Lancelot will mean wealth and a title.

There is one problem. Lancelot is terrified of women. He flees, with the maidens in hot pursuit. He takes refuge at an abbey. The monks make a big show of their poverty although in fact they live in luxury and dine in magnificent style.

The Baron von Chauterelle is devastated at the disappearance of his nephew. He makes a public offer - he will give Lancelot an immense sum of money if he marries.

The wily abbot comes up with a clever scheme. The famous dollmaker Hilarius makes lifelike life-size female dolls. The dolls are advertised as being suitable for bachelors and widowers. The dolls are operated by clockwork and can perform all kinds of lifelike action such as dancing.

Now another problem arises. Lancelot thinks these dolls are a bit too lascivious. He thinks their dancing is positively indecent. There is a solution at hand. Hilarius has just completed a new doll, made in the image of his daughter Ossi (played by Ossi Oswalda). He assures Lancelot that this doll is of good character.

Fate steps in when Hilarius’s fifteen-year-old apprentice accidentally breaks the new doll. To save the apprentice from punishment Ossi will pretend to be the doll, until the apprentice can repair the actual doll. Ossi, pretending to be the doll, is shown to Lancelot. Lancelot is so delighted that he not only immediately buys her, he decides to take her with him on the spot. He sets off for his uncle’s castle, in a carriage drawn by two horses that are clearly men in horse costumes, which adds further to the fairy tale feel.

So we have an actress named Ossi playing the part of a girl named Ossi who is masquerading as a doll which is masquerading as a real girl. That’s the sort of movie this is - everything is multiple layers of artificiality and the artificiality is all clearly on view.

Much amusement ensues for the viewer as Ossi keeps reverting to her real self when Lancelot isn’t looking and then reverts to her masquerade as a doll when he is looking.

Much of that amusement is somewhat risqué. At times very risqué. And of course interesting things are going to happen on Lancelot’s wedding night, given that he thinks that his bride is simply a mechanical doll.

Parts of the sets are simply painted backdrops. When the sun rises it’s a cartoon sun with a smiley face. Some of the humour is broad and some is sharp and witty. Grasping monks and greedy relatives (waiting for the old baron to die) come in for some rough treatment.

The apprentice is a hoot. It’s like he’s fifteen going on thirty-five, and a cynical world-weary thirty-five. The characters are not the least bit realistic and yet weirdly we believe in them. Lancelot could have come across as a fool and a milksop but somehow he manages to engage our sympathies. Ossi Oswalda gives a bravura comic performance.

This movie is a mix of cleverness and good-natured fun. It’s bizarre, but in a good way. Unlike most fairy tale moves it does not make a single concession to realism at any point. It revels in its artificiality.

I can’t think of any other movie that pushes deliberate artificiality as far as this but it works. Highly recommended.

Male and Female (1919)

Male and Female is a 1919 Cecil B. DeMille comedy/melodrama and it’s the movie that made twenty-year-old Gloria Swanson a major star.

This is a DeMille comedy so don’t expect any slapstick. DeMille’s silent comedies were witty and sophisticated comedies of manners. The movie was based on J.M. Barrie’s 1902 hit play The Admirable Crichton.

The story concerns an aristocratic family shipwrecked on a remote island in the South Seas. They soon discover that their survival depends on the butler, Crichton. He’s the only one who understands what they will need to do in order to survive. It’s obviously a satire on class relations.

The early scenes in the palatial home of Lord Loam (Theodore Roberts) set up some of the key relationships and conflicts.

Crichton (Thomas Meighan) is the butler. He’s a very efficient butler and the household runs smoothly. Of course to the family he’s a mere servant. A valuable servant, but still just a servant.

Tweeny, the scullery maid (played by the amazingly cute eighteen-year-old Lila Lee), is hopelessly in love with Crichton. Crichton isn’t interested. He’s fallen madly in love with Lord Loam’s spoilt but beautiful daughter Lady Mary (Gloria Swanson). It’s hopeless of course. Aristocratic ladies do not marry servants. Actually one of Lady Mary’s friends did marry her chauffeur. Lady Mary was horrified. She would never consider doing anything so outrageous.

Everything changes when the family sets off in a yacht for a cruise in the South Seas. The yacht is shipwrecked. The island does not appear on any charts. This is 1919. There weren’t going to be any aerial searches. They could be stuck on the island for years.

The members of the aristocratic family naturally assume that they will be able to lie about on the beach while Crichton and Tweeny fix breakfast for them and do all those menial tasks that servants are supposed to carry out. Crichton has other ideas. He realises that if they’re going to survive they will all have to pitch in and work. This causes outrage. Lady Mary is aghast. But they don’t have much choice. It’s immediately apparent that Crichton is the only one who has a clue what he’s doing and it’s equally obvious that he is a natural leader. He simply takes charge.

Pretty soon Crichton is more or less king of the tiny island. Lady Mary’s feelings towards him have changed radically. She wants to be his willing slave. He’s so strong and wise and decisive. And so manly.

In Lady Mary and Tweeny both want to be Crichton’s slave. It has to be said that Crichton rather enjoys having two beautiful women competing for his attentions.

The ending is not the typical Hollywood ending you’ll be expecting.

Like a number of other DeMille silent movies this one includes an historical dream/fantasy sequence. DeMille loved these scenes and they gave him an early opportunity to display his skill at creating an atmosphere of decadence which he could use as a counterpoint to the decadence of the modern world. And an opportunity to show his mastery of historical spectacle. In this case the fantasy starts out being Crichton’s fantasy, with himself as a Babylonian king and Lady Mary as his slave. Crichton likes this fantasy. It excites Lady Mary a good deal as well.

The shipwreck scene provides DeMille with another opportunity to offer spectacle. DeMille set high standards for himself and for those who worked for him. If the movie was going to include a shipwreck scene it would be a shipwreck scene that would knock the audience’s socks off. And it does. It’s not just impressive by the standards of 1919. It’s impressive by the standards of today.

Gloria Swanson was an ideal star from DeMille’s point of view. She wasn’t given to the exaggerated performances that we often associate with silent film stars. She looked fabulous in the fashions of 1919. She looked fabulous in the ancient Babylonian costumes. And she looked great dressed as a kind of amazon huntress, a guise in which she also appears in this movie. She was sexy and glamorous.

Some of the DVD releases of this movie have been savagely cut. The copy I have is an Italian DVD which includes the full original cut 115-minute cut in two versions, one with the title cards in English and the other with the title cards in Italian. The transfer is acceptable.

If you think of slapstick when someone mentions silent comedies you’ll be pleasantly surprised by this one. It’s sophisticated comedy, and it’s also a fine romantic melodrama and an effective satire. And it’s a DeMille movie so it’s always visually interesting. When I saw this movie for the first time some years back it changed the way I think about silent cinema. Very highly recommended.