The thief of Baghdad (1924)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The thief of Baghdad |
| Original title | The Thief of Baghdad |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1924 |
| length | 139 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 6 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Raoul Walsh |
| script |
Douglas Fairbanks , James T. O'Donohoe |
| production | Douglas Fairbanks |
| music | Mortimer Wilson |
| camera | Arthur Edeson |
| cut | William Nolan |
| occupation | |
| |
The Thief of Baghdad is an American silent film directed by Raoul Walsh from 1924. It is the first large-scale film adaptation of a fairy tale from the Arabian Nights and is considered one of the artistic highlights in the career of leading actor Douglas Fairbanks , who also participated in the Was involved in script and production.
action
In medieval Baghdad , the skilled thief Ahmed lives and steals into the day. One day the thief and his companion plan to break into the caliph's castle and steal valuable treasure. In the castle, however, he sees the sleeping princess, the caliph's daughter , and because of her beauty he forgets to steal the treasure. He immediately falls in love with her. The Mongolian slave and maid of the princess discovers Ahmed and notifies the guards, but he escapes them. After his companion Ahmed tells that in the time of Harun ar-Raschid a master thief had stolen a princess, he wants to try that too.
The next day the princess celebrates her birthday and is supposed to be married. The princes from Mongolia , India and Persia appear at the court of the caliph. The princess is by no means impressed by the three men and especially the sinister Mongol prince scares her. When Ahmed rides into the courtyard under invented titles and with stolen clothes, the princess is enthusiastic about him and chooses him as her husband. Out of a guilty conscience, Ahmed gives up his kidnapping plans and confesses the truth about himself to the princess. Meanwhile, the princess’s Mongolian servant has recognized the alleged prince as the thief from last night. She reports about it to the Mongolian prince, who together with the caliph arranges for Ahmed's arrest. Ahmed is flogged and is said to be killed by a wild giant monkey. However, the princess still stands by Ahmed and bribes the guards so that they expose Ahmed on the streets of Baghdad.
The caliph asks his daughter to take one of the three other princes. To gain time, she asked each of the princes to return to Baghdad with a gift after seven months or around seven moons. The one who brings the rarest gift should have it as a wife. The three princes go in search of such a gift: the prince from Persia locates a magic carpet , the prince from India a magical glass ball , the Mongolian prince a wonderful apple that can cure all diseases.
Meanwhile, Ahmed regrets his previous life and seeks an imam whom he had previously mocked for his religiosity . The imam shows him a way to become a prince and a man of great importance: In a fairytale world, he has to endure all kinds of exciting and life-threatening adventures and avoid many temptations. At the end of the seven-month path, however, a casket awaits Ahmed, which is more extraordinary and powerful than the gifts of the three princes. Ahmed makes his way back to Baghdad.
The Mongolian prince had meanwhile arranged for the princess to be poisoned so that he could play the savior with his healing apple and be promised her hand. The three princes meet again shortly before Baghdad. Here the Indian prince looks into his crystal ball and sees that the princess is dying. With the help of the magic carpet of the Persian prince they reach the castle of the caliph very quickly. The Mongol prince uses the apple to heal the princess and claims the marriage, but the other two princes point to their part in saving the princess. After the princess sees in the magic glass ball that Ahmed is on the way to her, she convinces her father to give further advice about the choice of the groom. The Mongolian prince does not want to wait any longer and brings Baghdad under his control in a nightly surprise attack.
The next day Ahmed reaches the city gate, which is guarded by the Mongols. With the help of his magical treasure, he creates an army out of nowhere, from which the majority of Mongolian soldiers flee. The Mongolian prince then wants to take his own life, but the Mongolian slave points out that he can still escape with the magic carpet and the princess. Ahmed gets through the remains of the Mongolian army through his invisibility cloak and is able to save the princess at the last moment. The grateful caliph no longer has anything against Ahmed's marriage to his daughter.
background
The idea came from Douglas Fairbanks , who at the time was at the height of his career. He was the first Hollywood actor to become a world star of cinema in adventure films. The film helped Anna May Wong , who appeared in a supporting role as a Mongolian slave at the court of Baghdad, to achieve her artistic breakthrough and made her internationally known as the first American actress of Chinese origin.
The film is a mixture of fantasy adventure with special effects such as the magic carpet trip and the stylistic means of expressionist film . The work of production designer William Cameron Menzies has been widely regarded as outstanding and groundbreaking.
In 1940, a British sound film was released under the title The Thief of Baghdad , produced by Alexander Korda , which is also considered a classic film today. Apart from their title and the main character of a thief from Baghdad, the plot of the two films has little in common.
Reviews
The Baghdad Thief is widely recognized as one of the highlights of Fairbanks' film career. At Rotten Tomatoes , the film has, based on 25 reviews, a positive rating of 96%. The lexicon of international films writes: “Unbelievably imaginative and cleverly staged. Still worth seeing as a Hollywood fairy tale classic. "
Awards
- In 1996 the film was included in the National Film Registry .
DVD release
The film was released in 2005 in Germany on DVD in a restored version. Gaylon Carter played the music on the organ. In the bonus section, the director of the film collection of the Cinémathèque française reports on the restoration work. There is also a short film The Rogue of Baghdad .
Web links
- The Thief of Bagdad in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ The Thief of Baghdad. Retrieved October 27, 2017 (English).
- ↑ The Thief of Baghdad. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed January 10, 2017 .