The ancestor (1919)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The ancestress |
| Country of production | Austria |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1919 |
| length | 84 (1919) 40 (today's fragment) minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director |
Luise Kolm Jakob Fleck |
| script | Luise Kolm Jakob Fleck based on the drama of the same name (1817) by Franz Grillparzer |
| production |
Anton Kolm Luise Kolm Jakob Fleck |
| occupation | |
| |
The Ahnfrau is an Austrian silent film from 1919 by Jakob Fleck and Luise Kolm with Liane Haid in the title role.
action
Berta, the daughter of Count Zdenko von Borotin, loses her scarf when she is caught in a gust of wind. It is blown into a castle courtyard, where it is noticed and picked up by Jaromir von Eschen. He starts to sing a song. This in turn is heard by Berta and she follows the sounds. Jaromir is hiding for fun. At the edge of a forest, Berta falls into the hands of robbers, who are driven away by Jaromir with a shot from his rifle. The young aristocratic woman faints as befits her status as she is perfectly formed. When Berta comes to, it is again Jaromir who serenades her, with which he quickly conquers the heart of the lovely maiden by storm.
Somewhat later. Berta's father, Count Zdenko von Borotin, has just learned that his cousin has died. This makes him, Zdenko, the last of his line. Berta rushes over and tells her father about the unsuccessful attack and her rescue by the nobleman. Zdenko hopes that the noble stranger might have turned up a worthy future son-in-law and would like to get to know him. Jaromir climbs the tendrils of the castle wall and meets with his beloved on the balcony. Again a gust of wind hits something; this time it's paper in the fireplace room. A wandering woman in billowing clothes appears out of nowhere. Count Zdenko, who has now fallen asleep, has just woken up and thinks he sees his daughter, like a ghostly figure, in front of him. Scared to death, he shouts “Away!”. The apparition moves away. The old man thinks he has only dreamed of all this and calls for his daughter Berta. She is still turtling with Jaromir and is reluctant to tear herself away from her boy of heart. Her father confronts her with what she has just seen with evil words, but Berta does not understand a word. She was on the balcony during the apparition! The servants are summoned, but also know nothing. The old man states: It must have been the ancestress! Count Zdenko explains to those present: the ancestress is a lost soul who always appears in the count's apartments when disaster looms. Her name was Berta too and was once forced into marriage by her parents. When she met her lover, she stabbed her husband.
Meanwhile, the robbers in the mountains are planning the next coup and don't want to let their last defeat sit on them. Zdenko and his daughter are worried and protect Jaromir, who is being pursued by the bandit, in the castle. Berta introduces him to her father, and Jaromir is judged a room. The following night, Jaromir, the ancestor, appears, whom he initially confuses with Berta because of her resemblance. Soldiers now want to recruit Jaromir for the fight against the robbers, but Jaromir refuses and justifies his reluctance to want to take care of Berta and her father. Count Zdenko, on the other hand, is ready to join the soldiers and take up the fight against the robbers. Jaromir is soon acting strangely and strangely. He climbs out of the window when a shot is fired that injures his arm. Berta treats his wound. One of the soldiers tells her that the notorious leader of the band of robbers was almost caught. He was shot at and a scrap of cloth was torn from him. Berta recognizes the fabric: it matches Jaromir's clothes. She is deeply shocked.
Berta strongly reproaches Jaromir, but remains in love with him and wants to hide him from the soldiers who are chasing him. Her plan is for her to flee with him around midnight. Despite Berta's warning, Jaromir grabs the dagger that has been hanging in a sheath on the wall since the times of the ancestors. A curse is said to cling to him. Jaromir hides in the catacombs of the castle, where he is discovered by one of the alleged soldiers. He stabs the man with the dagger and realizes too late that it is Count Zdenko. One of the robbers wants to speak to the seriously injured man. Count Zdenko learns that his son, whom he believed drowned twenty years ago, grew up with the robbers and is none other than Jaromir. Jaromir also learns about his relationship to the old count. Then the seriously injured person dies. Zdenko's body is laid out in the castle crypt. Jaromir, the murderer of his own father, blames himself very much. Berta appears and collapses dead in her father's crypt after the ancestor has appeared to her again. Finally Jaromir, to whom the ancestress has also appeared, is also caught. Only after the death of the last of those from Borotin does the ancestor find her eternal rest, and the spook is over.
Production notes
The ancestor was created in the spring of 1919 and was premiered in Vienna on August 22, 1919. The German premiere took place in November of the same year in the Berlin Passage Theater. The six-character had a length of 2060 or 1978 meters, depending on the censorship version.
Buildings and furnishings come from Franz Meschkan .
Reviews
On the day of the Vienna premiere, Vienna's Neue Freie Presse reported in its edition of August 22, 1919: "The wonderful work of Grillparzer finds brilliant interpretation in the artistically perfect facial expressions of the participating Viennese artists and the purposeful direction has done everything to make the first film, who accuses a poem by our greatest local poet of making it a glamorous premiere. "
Later reception
“Neufeld in a double game as the notorious robber captain and nobleman von Eschen. There is a curse on the Borotin house. The appearance of the ancestor, who floats through the old walls with a waving robe, heralds the impending disaster. It is personified by Jaromir, with whom the young daughter of Count Borotin (Liane Haid) falls in love. Nothing is what it seems in this drama, and so the tragedy inevitably takes its bloody course - until the sex is obliterated. And with that the ancestress is also redeemed. The motifs and conflicts of art film productions have become noticeably more raw after the end of the war. Not only that the otherwise usual happy ending of love dramas now has an almost always tragic, sometimes even catastrophic outcome. Apparently, the real experience of the war also left its mark on the cinematic drama. "
Individual evidence
- ↑ Meschkan is sometimes called with the wrong first name "Alfred"
- ↑ "The Ancestress". In: Neue Freie Presse , August 22, 1919, p. 10 (online at ANNO ).
- ↑ The ancestor on stummfilm.at
Web links
- The ancestor at The German Early Cinema Database
- The ancestor at filmportal.de
- The ancestress in the Internet Movie Database (English)